


Say What You Mean, Do What You Say

by Lianne S (maggie_danger)



Category: Ouran High School Host Club - All Media Types
Genre: Cigarettes, Dubious Consent, M/M, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-02
Updated: 2012-11-01
Packaged: 2017-11-17 13:56:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 44,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/552289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maggie_danger/pseuds/Lianne%20S
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kyouya and Tamaki make a bad decision one night, then follow it up with more that are possibly worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Champagne room

**Author's Note:**

> This is the repost of a 7-part story (under my other name, Maggie Danger) that was completed in 2011. For the entire thing and its original notes, please visit http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4784792/1/Say-What-You-Mean-Do-What-You-Say or the last chapter (with links to entire archive) at http://maggie-danger.livejournal.com/4731.html.
> 
> Yes, I originally posted on ff.net. THAT WAS THE "IT" PLACE WHEN I WAS A TEENAGER AND I'M LOYAL, OKAY?
> 
> Warning: This story is mean.
> 
> My original light novel serial can be found at www.tokyodemons.com. I pretty much live there now.

“He turned 18 today,” Kyouya said evenly, leaning back in his leather chair.

The cocktail waitress, attractive and made-up and probably no older than 25, beamed at Tamaki. “Eighteen!” she exclaimed as she set down his peach iced tea. “Aren’t we all grown up!”

Tamaki flashed her a dazzling smile. He said something about how darling she was to say such a thing, but Kyouya barely heard it over the clinking of the ice in his glass. He wasn’t in the mood. His father had made a back-handed comment at breakfast that had soured Kyouya’s disposition, and all Kyouya wanted to do was forget about the world and his place in it for awhile. Tamaki reminding him of host club policy did exactly the opposite.

Kyouya downed his drink and clanked the glass down on a table. “I’ll have another,” he told the girl.

She smiled in that not-quite-fake way that good girls in bad jobs smile. “Sure,” she said. “What were you having? Long Island Iced Tea?”

“No alcohol for us,” Tamaki reminded her politely. “He’s only 18, too.”

She tapped her chin. “Oh...that must be what the note on the doorknob means.” She raised her eyebrows. “How unusual, to have a champagne room all to yourselves when you’re not even drinking.”

Tamaki slapped Kyouya’s back. Kyouya grimaced.

“My father said he’d sponsor a private night on the town with any one of my friends,” he explained. “Kyouya researched this club himself. And I agree--the place is lovely.” He batted his eyelashes at the girl. “As is reflected by its employees.”

She laughed. “You’re cute. I think Keiko would like you. I’ll send her back with your next round of drinks, yeah?”

“But I’ll miss you.”

“Ha ha! Don’t worry, I’ll be back later.”

Kyouya wished the thumping music in the rest of the club bled into their room better. He picked up his glass and sucked an ice cube into his mouth to try and drown out Tamaki.

The girl left. Tamaki reached for the menu and asked Kyouya something about appetizers, but all Kyouya heard was vague thumping music and crunching ice.

Tamaki blinked at him. Kyouya swallowed the ice and sighed.

“What?”

“I asked if you were okay.” Tamaki frowned. “You’ve been so quiet today, Kyouya.”

Kyouya tapped long fingers against his glass. “Don’t worry about me,” he muttered. “This is your day.”

Tamaki made some sort of a snort and pulled Kyouya’s glass out of his hand. “I’d enjoy it a lot more if _you_ were enjoying it,” he said. “What’s the matter? Are you hungry?”

“I’m fine,” Kyouya replied. “And no.”

“Well, I’m hungry.” Tamaki dropped his eyes back to the menu. “And you didn’t have dinner, so you’re probably just cranky because you have low blood sugar.”

Kyouya didn’t bother arguing. He looked up at the large windows in their darkened room, covered with thick, shimmering curtains. He briefly considered pulling back the curtains so he’d at least have the view of the rest of the club to distract him.

Tamaki picked up the phone on the table and ordered a few appetizers. He’d no sooner put the receiver down than another woman, this one with much more make-up and a short black dress that didn’t look like a uniform, came in with a tray of drinks.

“Suou-san?” she asked in a honey-thick voice. “Which one of you is the birthday boy?”

Kyouya frowned. Tamaki, clearly missing the innuendo in her voice, smiled at her.

“That would be me...Keiko?”

“You’ve heard of me.” She winked and put down the drinks. “I was wondering if maybe the birthday boy wanted a dance.”

“With you?” Tamaki laughed. “I’d be honored! But I’m afraid I’m more classically trained than club-trained. I might embarrass you.”

She gave a smile that was half wry. “You don’t have to do a thing, sweetheart. I’ll give _you_ a dance.”

“Oh.” Tamaki wilted a little. “Here? But you can’t hear the music very well.”

Kyouya sighed.

Keiko threw a glance at Kyouya, as if in question. Kyouya blankly stared back.

“Do you...want me to ask your friend to leave?” she asked Tamaki.

“Why? He’s my guest.”

“Well...I don’t want to embarrass _you,_ baby.”

“Why would you embarrass--“

“You know what?” Kyouya finally interjected. He sat up angrily. “I think we’ll pass, miss.”

Keiko slid a long nail between her red lips. “You sure?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “A boy only turns eighteen once. Are you eighteen, megane-san?”

Kyouya ignored the question and gripped one of the new drinks. “We just ordered appetizers,” he told her.

Tamaki opened his mouth to say something, but Kyouya just threw him a glare. Tamaki closed his mouth.

“Suit yourself.” Keiko took her tray and left the room without a word.

The two boys sat in silence for a moment. Kyouya took a long drink of whatever fruit cocktail he’d picked up.

“I think you insulted the woman,” Tamaki finally muttered, crossing his arms as he leaned back into the couch.

Kyouya clanked his glass down with a little more force than was necessary. “She’ll be fine,” he assured him.

“I’m sure she will be. But it’s a sad day when your negative mood affects the people around you.” Tamaki glared a little. “This isn’t like you, Kyouya. What’s bothering you?”

“A _lot_ of things are bothering me,” Kyouya snapped back. “And I don’t want to talk about a single one of them, all right? This is your birthday, so just enjoy it and get off my case.” He went digging through his pockets, irritated. “Where are my cigarettes? Where’s my coat?”

Tamaki let out a breath. “You know I hate it when you smoke.”

“Spare me a single cigarette, Tamaki.” Kyouya went over to the empty couch where he vaguely remembered throwing his coat. Tamaki’s bag lay on top of it, so he pushed it aside.

And heard a clink.

Kyouya paused. As he unclasped Tamaki’s bag, he vaguely heard Tamaki’s tired lecture.

“Health risks aside, you know smoking increases the aesthetic effects of aging, don’t you? And it smells, it’s uncultured, and your father would be disappointed in you if he found out.”

“It’s not hard to disappoint my father,” Kyouya said flatly as he dug through Tamaki’s bag. He pulled out a flat glass bottle and tilted it to catch some of the dim mood lighting of the room. “Is this rum?”

Tamaki stopped whatever he was about to say next. “What?”

Kyouya held up the bottle and shook it. Tamaki sat up. “Was that in my bag?!”

“Are you saying you didn’t pack it?”

“Of course I didn’t pack it!” Tamaki jumped out of his chair. “How would...ugh, it was probably those stupid twins! They said they packed me a present, but I thought they were kidding.”

Kyouya snorted. “This is one of those rare occurrences where I appreciate their pranks,” he said as he unscrewed the cap and took a long swig.

“Kyouya!” Tamaki ran over and grabbed the bottle away. The action knocked Kyouya’s glasses askew.

The doorknob suddenly turned. Tamaki flew around and hid the booze behind his back.

The first cocktail waitress came in with their appetizers. She smiled at the two of them as Kyouya fixed his glasses.

“Everything okay in here?” she asked. “You’re a little red, Suou-san.”

Tamaki waved a free hand. “I’m fine,” he said, his voice a bit higher than it usually was. “Thank you for, um...coming back.”

“Sure. Keiko said you boys were a little shy. But you’re not shy with me, are you, Suou-san?”

“Of course not. You’re so kind, miss.” Tamaki paused. “Not that Keiko-san wasn’t.”

The waitress laughed. “Don’t worry about it.”

Tamaki paused again.

Kyouya sat back down. “Can we get a few Cokes?” he asked.

“If it’s Coke you want, it’s actually in the mini bar behind you. Feel free to help yourself.” She folded her tray in front of her knees. “Can I get you anything else?”

“Um...no, thank you,” Tamaki said. “Actually, at this point I think I’d like a little privacy.”

“Of course. Call if you need anything.” The waitress smiled once more before leaving the room. There was a slight flapping noise as the sign hanging on the doorknob was flipped.

Tamaki let out a long breath and brought the rum out from behind his back. “It’s illegal for us to have this,” he said.

Kyouya fetched a few Cokes from the mini bar. “I’m going to tell you in complete certainty that they don’t care,” he muttered. “We’re in a private room, it’s your birthday, and your rich-as-hell father is sponsoring the night. The only thing that _would_ bother them is the fact that you brought your own booze instead of buying it discreetly from them.” Kyouya popped the tabs on both cans simultaneously as he sat down. “Give me back my glass with the ice in it.”

Tamaki stared at Kyouya a moment. He seemed disappointed--which didn’t really surprise Kyouya.

Kyouya rested the cans of soda on the table and rubbed at his temples. He closed his eyes for a second and breathed deeply.

 _Calm down,_ he told himself. _You’re making things needlessly complicated._

“Tamaki,” he said at last, much more calmly this time. “I’m sorry.”

Tamaki said nothing.

“I don’t...mean to be a dick on your birthday.”

Tamaki frowned. “I’m worried about you,” he murmured as he slowly sat down beside Kyouya on the couch.

“Really, don’t be.” Kyouya carefully unpried Tamaki’s fingers from the alcohol. “I’m just in a mood. I’ll be okay in a few minutes.”

“Did something happen today?”

“Nothing unusual.” Kyouya mixed two rum and Cokes and held one out at Tamaki. Tamaki eyed it uncomfortably.

“You drink wine with dinner sometimes, don’t you?”

Tamaki squinted. “Yeah, but...”

“If you’re worried about getting in trouble,” Kyouya reasoned, “you’d be better off getting rid of the evidence.”

Tamaki blinked. He stared at Kyouya, then smiled sadly and accepted the offered glass. “You always make a good point,” he said, carefully clinking his glass against Kyouya’s. “Just promise me you won’t drink _and_ smoke, okay?”

**********************************

The fingerfood Tamaki had ordered was classy, but unfilling. Kyouya didn’t really care--he just wanted something to do with his hands. He was pouring rum into his third glass of Coke when Tamaki hiccupped.

Tamaki put down his glass. “I think I’m done,” he said, a little embarrassed.

Kyouya lazily took a long drink, glad that his anxiety had lessened a bit. “Are you still hungry?” he asked.

“No, just...a little tired.” Tamaki rubbed the back of his neck. “Want to talk?”

“As long as it’s not about my problems.”

Tamaki ran his tongue over his teeth. He blinked slowly, his eyelids a bit uneven when he did so. “Fine,” he said at last. “Um...was that waitress earlier offering me a striptease or something?”

Kyouya pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Well, well.”

“Don’t make fun of me, Kyouya.”

“You were just acting pretty innocent for a guy who knew what she was offering.”

Tamaki frowned. “Not really...it just struck me after the fact. But the whole thing was pretty weird at the time, admittedly.”

Kyouya found a toothpick on the table and slid it between his teeth. “This isn’t a strip club,” he said after a moment. “And she was dressed pretty crassly, but she wasn’t a stripper. She was more likely offering you something more personal, like a lap dance.”

“Oh, God.” Tamaki dropped his head into his hands.

“Don’t be such a baby.”

“That kind of thing doesn’t creep you out? I thought this was just a dance club.”

Kyouya chewed on the toothpick. “Well, I knew they offered some gentleman extras for their V.I.P. guests, but I didn’t expect them to be so forward about it. I didn’t think it was enough reason to rule this place out when I was deciding where to go tonight.”

Tamaki rubbed his face. “Ugh.”

Kyouya ran a thumb up his glass. “You’re not regretting turning her down, are you? A lap dance doesn’t really seem your style.”

“Of course I’m not regretting it. I’m not interested in...well, not interested in that kind of...” Tamaki trailed off, curling his shoulders in as he fell deeper into the couch.

Kyouya paused. _It’s not that you’re **completely**_ _disinterested,_ he thought, finishing Tamaki’s dead line. Despite the extremely weird route his sexuality had taken through the formation of the host club, Tamaki was still a man. Kyouya had caught those blue eyes lingering a bit too long on the covers of adult magazines they passed in commoner convenience stores.

“Kyouya,” Tamaki murmured at last, his gaze tilting up slightly. “Have you ever...”

The question was so predictable, it was almost funny. Kyouya was about to make a rude comment but decided against it. It was Tamaki’s birthday and they’d been drinking, after all. If they were ever going to have the weird sex talk, there was no better (or rather, less bad) time.

“I’ve fooled around with a few girls,” Kyouya said, pausing to drain his glass. “Nothing serious, though.”

Tamaki froze, his mouth agape. “You...what?!” he exclaimed. “When? With who?!”

Kyouya reached over for the drink Tamaki had failed to finished. “Don’t worry--not with anybody you know. I always have to go to parties and social events with my father’s clients and their families, and sometimes a young lady is very interested and it would be, well, rude to turn her down.” He turned the glass around in his hand until he found a spot where Tamaki’s lip prints weren’t visible, then drank from it. “It’s never very much or for very long, though. It’s much easier for things to go sour if it’s anything more than a drunken hook-up in a closet or something.”

Tamaki just stared, the slight flush to his cheeks and the slight haze to his eyes making him look more like a little boy than a drunken legal adult.

“I...I can’t believe you would do that,” he breathed. “You would actually put your hands on a girl for political reasons?”

Kyouya sighed. “You’re the _last_ person who can criticize me for that,” Kyouya retorted. “We run a host club at our high school. We string girls along to fulfill your own twisted fantasies of romance and, lest we forget, _for financial gain._ ”

“But...we never _touch_ them!”

“Are you kidding me? You always touch them.”

“But not like that!”

“Like what? Kissing and petting with all your clothes on? I’m not sleeping with these girls, I’m fooling around with them.” Kyouya reached for the rum bottle, but it was nearly empty. He drank the last of the booze from the bottle itself.

“Listen, Tamaki.” Kyouya sniffed and leaned back in his chair, enjoying the warm feeling of being sloshed for a change. “It’s not a big step between holding a girl’s hand and kissing her on the cheek at the host club and grinding up with a client’s daughter under a buffet table so she’ll tell Daddy the Ootori’s can throw a good party. It’s emotional prostitution with the promise of a bit of physical contact. The only thing that differs is the severity.” He thought a moment. “And I guess the fact that _you_ get off on it, and I usually don’t.”

Tamaki stood up suddenly, a strange mix of anger and embarrassment on his face. Kyouya just stared up at him, bored.

Tamaki opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. He looked away.

“...That’s an awful way to think of things.”

“It’s not my perception, Tamaki--it’s the truth.”

“But...” Again, Tamaki started to say something, but the words ended up dying in his throat. He buried his face in a hand, his long fingers plowing up through his bangs.

Kyouya crossed one leg over the other and threw his arms out over the back of the couch. “We’re not taking advantage of these girls,” he decided to add. “They come to _us,_ and they know exactly what they’re getting. If anything, we’re the ones taking the emotional and physical hit, since we’re constantly letting them objectify us and take exactly what they want from us.” His mouth continued to move, the rum calling out more words than Kyouya usually felt the need to let out. “Who do you think goes to the bathroom to jerk off after my little trysts? It’s certainly not the girl leaving unsatis--”

“Kyouya!”

Kyouya decided he’d said enough. He sniffed, then was silent.

Tamaki said nothing for nearly a minute, his eyes glassy from the alcohol and from whatever emotion roiled through him. Kyouya found himself getting annoyed with the sight.

 _Poor little prince,_ he thought sourly. _Look at the awful forces around you, dragging your tender heart from its good intentions to cruel reality._

Eventually, Tamaki swallowed. “Kyouya,” he said slowly, “I had no idea you were so...angry about all this.”

Kyouya grunted. “Not angry,” he corrected. “Frustrated.”

Frustrated. _Frustrated, frustrated, frustrated._ The word was so apt at describing his persistent state of being. Kyouya could barely remember stretches of more than a day when he didn’t feel frustration clawing at his insides.

Tamaki sighed and sat back down on the couch. “I know you don’t have it easy,” he murmured. “Your father can be very difficult, and you have so many expectations layered on top of you. And I think the expectations you have for yourself are much harsher than what your father puts on you.”

Kyouya snorted, but said nothing.

Tamaki rested a hand on Kyouya’s shoulder tenderly. “I’m sorry, Kyouya.”

Kyouya sighed and ignored the physical contact. “I don’t know why you’re apologizing, Tamaki.”

“Well...I’m sure I frustrate you, too.”

Kyouya was about to affirm that statement, but decided it would be a nasty thing to do. Besides, his rare moments of relaxation usually occurred around Tamaki, especially when they were alone.

“Don’t worry about it,” Kyouya muttered.

Tamaki slowly leaned in closer, his face inches away from Kyouya’s. Kyouya watched in confusion as Tamaki leaned his head to the side so his cheek rested against the dark leather of the couch back.

“Kyouya,” his whispered, his eyes heavy-lidded.

Kyouya suddenly felt very uncomfortable. “Wh-what?” he blurted.

“Can you...tell me what it’s like to touch a girl?”

Kyouya blinked several times at him. Had he heard that right?

Tamaki moaned and rubbed his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I’m really tired, and this is probably _really_ trashy. It’s just...I don’t know.” He frowned. “I envy how you can look at all this so calmly. I know that what we do at the host club is only play-dating, and I know liking it as much as I do is weird. But I get frustrated sometimes, too. And unlike you, I can’t look back and see the bigger picture and justify everything I do. I want to have a real relationship, I want to...have sex eventually, but I’m confused and don’t know where to start and Haruhi never takes me seriously, and what’s wrong with me, Kyouya? I’m not a kid anymore, but sometimes I feel like one because this is all so intimidating and I’m awkward and a little terrified and I don’t want her to hate me.” He slapped a hand over his eyes and pressed his trembling lips together.

Based on the speed with which the last few lines had been delivered, Kyouya figured he’d just heard a fair portion of the spectrum of Tamaki’s insecurities. None of them surprised him in the slightest. He was a bit relieved, however, to know that Tamaki had actually thought about such topics instead of brushing them off and living in his own personal la-la land.

The mention of Haruhi was perhaps the least surprising. Kyouya knew Tamaki wanted her, Kyouya himself wanted her, Hikaru definitely wanted her, and probably most of the boys who’d ever met her wanted her in some way or another. It was her complete lack of all the bitching and nagging and emotional neediness that teenage girls were often loaded with that made her the ideal “no hassle” female, and it was her dismissive nature that made her that much more alluring, the perpetual wet dream of teenage boys who could never touch her and would never dare try.

Although Tamaki had a slightly better chance than most at eventually winning her over, that wasn’t saying much. Wanting her was frustrating enough for Kyouya--he could only imagine what it was like for Tamaki, who (by his own admission) was bad at stepping back and viewing his life’s potential from afar.

 _Frustration._ It was a killer, and Kyouya was getting a little sick of it.

“Fine,” Kyouya murmured, sliding off his glasses and folding them into his breast pocket. He rested his cheek against the couch, the mirror image of Tamaki. “Close your eyes.”

Tamaki’s hand slid from his face. “What?” he asked blearily, more tired by the moment.

“It’s your birthday, so I’ll humor you. Just as long as we never do this again or speak of it again.”

Tamaki frowned, confused.

“Just close your eyes, you idiot.”

Tamaki sighed and followed the order. Kyouya, whose vision was already hazy from the alcohol and the fact that his glasses were off, decided to block out the dim light of the room by closing his eyes as well.

“There was this one time a few months ago. It was a party we...you know what, it doesn’t matter where it was. It was behind a curtain in an abandoned guest room in this mansion. She was...a little older than we are, I think. But petite and slim and a little curvy, with this...little mouth painted in red lipstick, which had a penchant for making naughty little smiles.”

Kyouya could hear Tamaki swallow. Kyouya himself felt pretty weird doing this, but he was bored and antsy and hadn’t really given Tamaki a present, and the room was warm and dark with an unending, muffled backbeat from the rest of the club bleeding through the walls and causing their couch to vibrate the slightest bit with every hard baseline. The mood was making his reservations seem silly and unnecessary. What was the harm in giving Tamaki a little jerk-off fodder? Maybe jerking off more would calm Tamaki the hell down.

“D-don’t tell me who she was or how you got there,” Tamaki whispered shakily.

“I won’t.” Kyouya took a breath. “She was wearing this little black dress. The kind where they have those thin straps that always look like they’re about to slip down a shoulder but they never do, and they always annoy me and make me think dirty thoughts when I’m supposed to be paying attention to something else. So the first thing I did after we started kissing was push the straps down and run my fingers along the little fault lines they made in her skin.”

Kyouya let his cheek sink a little deeper in the warm leather, letting the alcohol pull the words unhindered from his mouth. “She was...a little drunk, I think, and horny as hell, because she kept hooking a knee around my hip and running a stockinged foot up and down the back of my thigh, which was just making me more hard. There was a window behind that curtain, but it only looked out on the abandoned lawn, so I pushed her up against it so I could grind my dick through my pants against her stomach.”

“Nn...did you touch her chest?”

“Just shut up and listen. No talking.”

“Sorry.”

“No talking!”       

“...”

Kyouya irritably tried to regain his train of thought. “Her dress was...it was a little clingy, so it was hard to push out of the way. I squeezed her breasts through her dress, but not hard, because I didn’t want to annoy her. She grabbed at my ass and started ramming her crotch against me, so I think I underestimated how rough she wanted it.”

Kyouya could hear Tamaki’s breathing grow more labored. Kyouya’s own breath was starting to hitch, his mind swimming with memories that simultaneously seemed very clear and very unreal. The blood started to drain from his brain and to his legs, making his jeans feel uncomfortably tight.

“I pushed her skirt up her thighs and grabbed her ass so I could lift her. I crammed her against the big rail of the windowpane and humped her through whatever other layers she was wearing under that dress. She was hot between her legs, the kind of heat a girl makes when there’s sweat and lube trapped in her underwear. She was clawing at my shoulders before long, squealing in my ear every time I rammed into her. I was trying not to cum, but her ass was so tight in my hands and her breasts were squashed against me and she started gnawing on my ear and I couldn’t stop grinding against her.”

Kyouya swallowed. “She kept begging me to go harder,” he said, his hoarse voice practically a whisper. “She asked me to fuck her. It was all I could do to keep from tearing through her clothes and nailing her against that window. But she suddenly started gasping and squeezed her legs against me, and she came so hard that she arched back almost in half and crammed her crotch even harder against me, and I couldn’t stop ramming her until I came, too, and by the time I could open my eyes again the window was fogged up behind us and she was mewling like a kitten and she ran a tongue up the side of my face...”

“Nngh.”

Kyouya, his heartbeat suddenly much louder in his ears, blearily opened his eyes. Tamaki’s face was still leaning up against the leather couch, his eyes closed, his cheeks flushed, and his mouth open just enough for him to breath heavily at Kyouya. His breath smelled like sugar and alcohol, and it was hot against Kyouya’s cheeks.

Kyouya suddenly noticed that his own dick was straining against his jeans. He mentally cursed himself, but found the false lull of the alcohol made him less embarrassed than he knew he should be. So what if he was hard? He was talking about the last girl he dry-humped until he came. And if _he_ was hard, choir boy Tamaki was probably...

Slowly, like molasses, Kyouya realized something. Tamaki’s hand had crept up his own thigh. His fingers were extended toward the lump in his khakis, almost as if he were planning to jerk off right in front of Kyouya.

Something strange came over Kyouya then. Tamaki was clearly half-asleep, drunk, and horny enough to consider touching himself in front of a friend. But Kyouya was feeling oddly displaced from the setting himself, and the concept of masturbating away the uncomfortable hardness in his pants while he and Tamaki had privacy didn’t seem very odd at all. They were comfortable around each other, right? Almost too comfortable. Comfortable enough to share the explicit details of a sex story in the back room of a club until they were both hard.

Kyouya closed his eyes again and shakily unbuttoned his jeans.

“Mmm...”

Kyouya could hear Tamaki moan and shift a little, the sound of moving fabric and skin against leather. There was something in having another warm body beside him, making noise and breathing heavily, that made Kyouya even harder. His slid his hand into his boxer-briefs and gripped his erection.

Kyouya opened his eyes.

Tamaki was staring at him through a heavy-lidded gaze. For a brief moment, Kyouya was petrified that Tamaki was looking at him while he had his hand down his pants. But the next moment he was even hornier, acutely aware of the way Tamaki’s breath was hot against his face, and that his salon shampoo made him smell a little like a girl, and that Tamaki had hands and a mouth and other parts and that it had been months since Kyouya had gotten off with another person.

“Kyouya,” Tamaki breathed.

Kyouya’s mind swam. “Sh-shut up,” he murmured, pulling his hand out of his pants. He gripped one of Tamaki’s wrists, the wrist that had so hesitantly rested against Tamaki’s hip, although Kyouya’s fingers shook so badly that he had trouble gripping it. “No...no talking.”

Tamaki’s eyebrows furrowed together in a delayed reaction as Kyouya pulled his wrist closer. “Kyouya,” he murmured, pulling back a little. “What’re you--”

“Shut up, dammit.” Kyouya slid Tamaki’s hand into his boxers, his fingers closing around Tamaki’s fingers, which, in turn, closed around Kyouya’s dick. Tamaki’s palm was hot and sweaty, so its confused trembling wasn’t enough to deter Kyouya’s libido. He squeezed Tamaki’s hand, then groaned at the feeling of strange fingers on him.

“Kyou--”

“Have you ever had a tongue in your mouth?” Kyouya whispered hoarsely. He jostled forward to undo Tamaki’s belt, bringing his face close enough to Tamaki’s that their foreheads touched.

Tamaki looked...confused, and shocked, and a little scared, but more than anything he looked dazed and horny, and he whimpered something incoherent when Kyouya’s hand went down his pants. That whimper opened his mouth, so Kyouya’s mind went blank and his libido took over and he was suddenly frenching his best friend because he needed someone, anyone, to get off with him for no political or financial or even emotional reason. He needed to let go where it was safe and he could, for once, take as much as he gave.

“Mmgh!” Tamaki choked as they kissed sloppily. Kyouya could smell and feel rum-and-coke tinted saliva dripping down his chin, because Tamaki didn’t know what he was doing and Kyouya didn’t feel like being neat. He pumped his fist up and down over Tamaki’s cock, simultaneously imagining that he was rubbing his own dick but reveling in the feeling of someone else’s palm doing the job. Tamaki’s jerks were shaky over Kyouya’s erection, and his palm slid off several times from the sweat and the precum.

 _Harder,_ Kyouya’s mind demanded as he shoved his other hand down his boxer-briefs to clamp down over Tamaki’s fingers. He guided Tamaki to a rougher grip, concurrently doing the same to Tamaki’s penis. _More,_ he thought as Tamaki moaned into his mouth and starting making quick, high-pitched gasps. Kyouya’s tongue snaked so crazily into Tamaki’s mouth that he nearly felt like he could go down the other boy’s throat. Tamaki gagged and whimpered and tilted up his chin as far as it would go with his mouth still captured.

 _Give it to me,_ Kyouya’s mind screamed. _Give it to me, you bitch._

Tamaki’s mouth suddenly opened against Kyouya’s lips and he cried out, his hips jerking forward into Kyouya’s grip. Hot semen spilled from his quivering erection and over Kyouya’s long fingers.

Kyouya didn’t tolerate Tamaki’s pause to orgasm, and at that point Kyouya was guiding Tamaki’s hand so frenetically that Tamaki’s palm was practically just a tool Kyouya was using to get himself off. Kyouya jerked that hand over himself faster, and when he finally reached his tipping point the world went white behind his eyelids and he grunted out as the surge of his cum erupted through his penis and squeezed through the tight tip.

It took a moment for the wash of orgasmic endorphins to clear out of Kyouya’s body. He panted, his hand still weakly over Tamaki’s and bunched up in his underwear. The room felt so hot it was stifling, the thumping of the music outside the room suddenly loud and invasive against his eardrums.

Tamaki was breathing hard. He weakly tried to pull his hand back from Kyouya, so Kyouya released him. Kyouya rubbed semen and sweat off his palms and onto a cocktail napkin, zipped up his fly, and tried to button his pants--but his fingers shook so much that he couldn’t manage the simple action. He eventually gave up and stumbled to his feet, at the same time pulling his glasses from his breast pocket.

Kyouya heard some sort of audible sound from Tamaki, but he wasn’t sure if it was a word or a whimper. He ignored it as he slid his glasses back onto his face and stumbled in the dim light to where he had left his jacket. His trembling hands fished for his jacket pocket, retrieved his box of cigarettes, and pushed back the top as he shook a tip free of its confines.

Kyouya caught the cigarette edge in his lips and pulled the box back. “I’m gonna have that smoke now,” he mumbled without looking back.

**********************************

Kyouya was silent for the rest of the night. Tamaki haltingly tried to talk to him a few times, but when Kyouya didn’t respond, Tamaki gave in to his clear desire to not discuss the matter himself. He called for their ride not long after and spent the time they waited cleaning up a bit.

The waitress came back to see them off, but all she got from Tamaki was a weak smile and a polite thanks. The two boys cut through the thundering club and into the fancy car that waited for them out front. Kyouya slammed the door shut behind them a little weaker than usual.

“Going anywhere else, Suou-sama?”

“Take me home,” Kyouya muttered.

The driver asked some polite confirmation, but Kyouya ignored it. Kyouya stared out the tinted windows and at the blurred nighttime lights as they rumbled through the streets.

Tamaki might’ve said goodbye, but Kyouya wasn’t certain--he hastily shut the car door behind him when he left. He entered his house, stalked up his stairs, ignored the maid who asked if he needed help, and drew a bath for himself. He locked the bathroom door behind him before shedding his clothes.

His underwear slipped from his hand and silently patted against the floor as he stared at the running water. The small room filled with steam, warming him, touching him, choking him. The scent of fancy bath salts and soaps mixed with the smell of sex and sweat and alcohol and cigarette smoke.

Kyouya gritted his teeth. He rubbed a fist into his eye and swallowed down the bile that threatened to surge up his throat. Only one thought crowded in duplicates in his mind, cramming into every corner of his brain and making him dizzy enough to feel sick to his stomach.

_What the fuck have I done?_


	2. Parked car

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story has terrible morals. More on that later.

Kyouya didn’t usually smoke in his room because of the smell. He could brush the tobacco remnants off his teeth and shampoo it out of his hair, but in his room the smell would sink into his sheets, his rugs, his walls. He had briefly considered buying Indian incense for his room so there would be a reason for smoky residue, but it just seemed...cliché. He wasn’t a dorm rat desperate to hide the evidence of marijuana. So he saved his cigarettes for the outdoors, for the public places that allowed smoking, and for the occasional light-up in his room that he could hide with an open window, a fan, and a spritz of air freshener.

He had to stop himself from shaking a third stick from his box. _Don’t be an idiot,_ he thought darkly as he pushed the cigarette back into its home. He was already shivering from having an open window and his fan running in the autumn.

Kyouya sighed and placed the box beside his notebook. It was the fifth day of his week break from school, and he’d studied almost non-stop in an attempt to avoid everything else. His maids had already started to worry about him, and he knew his family was close behind. He needed to do something. He needed to get out.

“Nngh.”

Kyouya shoved his chair back and stood from his desk. Four days and he couldn’t get that moan Tamaki had made out of his head. Kyouya slammed shut the window, turned off his fan, and scraped his keys and his cigarettes from the desk before leaving his room.

He nearly ran into his older sister. She stood just outside his door, her hand raised in the air mid-knock.

“Oh.” Her eyes widened. “You’re awake, Kyouya-san.”

“Did you think I wasn’t?” he asked, a little uncomfortable that she’d come to see him. He subtly slid the box of cigarettes into his pocket.

“No, it’s just...you were so quiet in there. And I’ve barely seen you lately--I thought you might be ill.”

Kyouya brushed off her concern by pushing his door shut behind his back. “I’m just busy,” he assured her. “I’ve been trying to catch up on my studies.”

“Oh. And you were at your friend’s birthday the other day, weren’t you? Did you have fun?”

Kyouya could feel tension clench all his muscles anew, but he swallowed down the tightness in his jaw. “It was...fine,” he murmured.

She smiled. “It’s so nice to hear about your social life. I still worry about you, you know, so preoccupied with school and Father and all the...” She trailed off, her nostrils twitching slightly as she sniffed him.

Kyouya wanted to kick his own ass. _Shit,_ he thought as his teeth clenched behind his lips.

“Do I smell...something burning?” she asked.

“Maybe,” he said as he carefully slid past her. “I was cooking earlier and got distracted--I burned my toast a little.”

“That doesn’t sound like you. And if you’re hungry, the cook mentioned that you haven’t been eating enough lately and he’d be happy to--“

“I really have to go,” Kyouya interrupted, walking quickly to the door that led to the garage. “If anyone asks, I went for a drive.”

“With who?”

“No one--I’m driving myself.”

“But I wanted to ask if you--“

Kyouya managed to get around a corner before she could finish her sentence, and then he was in his family’s mammoth parking garage with the door closed behind him--effectively cutting her off for good. He let out a breath.

_I need to get out._

His sister’s sudden attention reminded him that his shut-in behavior was going to attract his family’s concerns. Despite the constant, quiet rumination that had mulled in the back of his head during his studying binge, he’d yet to really put himself in an environment where he could sit and think clearly.

He pushed the security button on his keys. A high-pitched chirping noise and flashing lights came from a pristine black car near the end of the garage. Kyouya still barely recognized the vehicle, despite it belonging to him.

He was enveloped with new car smell when he lowered himself into the leather driver’s seat. He shut the door behind him, buckled his seatbelt, locked the door, and turned the key in the ignition.

And then sat there.

And sat there.

Kyouya didn’t know how much time passed. Not even thoughts of wasting gas or slowly filling the huge garage with carbon monoxide could penetrate the haze of his mind. And the odd thing was, he wasn’t even ruminating again. Or thinking at all, really. He just sat there, staring at his hands on the wheel, his mind a complete and utter blank.

It was a new feeling for Kyouya. One of the traits that defined him was that he _never_ shut his brain off. And yet there he sat, the shut-down completely unintentional. It was like a part of him, over the past several days, had decided to purposely avoid deep thinking--and now that he was addressing that, it was shutting things up even tighter.

_“Mmgh!”_

It was the audio memory that finally broke his thought boycott. It felt like a slap to the face.

He cleared his throat and blinked his eyes twice. He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, flipped it open, and pushed #2 on his speed dial.

There were several fuzzy rings against his ear, each buzz raising his blood pressure a few points. And then there was that familiar clicking noise of someone answering.

“Kyouya?”

Almost like magic, the tension fell away. The memories of Tamaki’s sex noises fell down some sort of bottomless pit in Kyouya’s mind, and the fact that they had seemed so traumatizing for so many days suddenly seemed both silly and embarrassing. Kyouya was transported back to the man he had been before Tamaki’s birthday.

It was simultaneously calming and jarring.

“Kyouya? Are you there?”

Kyouya suddenly realized he’d been sitting in silence. “Yes,” he said abruptly, switching his cell phone to his other ear. “Yeah, I’m...look, where are you right now?”

“Huh? Uh...I just got home, actually.”

“I’m coming to pick you up. I’ll be there in 15 minutes. Are you free?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. “Yeah,” Tamaki said at last.

“Fifteen minutes. At the front of your place. I’m taking my car.”

“Yeah,” Tamaki said, with much less hesitation this time.

“We need to talk,” Kyouya said, and he was much more calm than he expected.

“Yeah,” Tamaki agreed. He sounded the same.

**********************************

 

Kyouya didn’t bother looking up when he heard his car door open. The rush of the fall evening air brushed against his cheeks, and the faint scent of the outdoors and Tamaki’s shampoo and fabric softener rushed in with it.

Tamaki gripped the top of the car door as he folded his long legs into the passenger’s seat. He pulled the door shut behind him, locking the car’s interior into a near-soundproof casing.

There was a pause. Then Tamaki spoke.

“This is the car your dad gave you for your birthday, right?”

Kyouya turned to him. Tamaki wore a white nylon jacket over his clothes, the zipper flanked with a gentle violet stripe, a deceptive piece of clothing that looked like a cheap windbreaker but probably cost five times what a commoner’s brand would. His cheeks were slightly flushed from the wind outside. Although the jacket was new, everything else about Tamaki was exactly as Kyouya remembered from before the club.

The complete normalcy of it all once again made him realize that the world hadn’t turned on his head like he’d subconsciously assumed. He wondered why his mind was still fascinated with that realization. It was starting to get silly.

“Yeah,” Kyouya said at last.

Tamaki smiled. It was a small smile, but it was honest, and Kyouya had the feeling it was spurred by a sense of relief as well.

Kyouya pulled the car’s stick back to the letter “D.” “Are you hungry?” he asked as he looked in the rearview mirror.

“I just ate, actually.”

“I was thinking of going through a drive-through.”

“In this?” Tamaki blinked at him. “You’re going to eat fast food in your new car?”

“I don’t really care about the car. I only got my license on my birthday to prove a point to my father, and he bought me this thing to prove a point back. It’s not like I--“

Kyouya was cut off by Tamaki’s laughter.

Kyouya sighed. He signaled back onto the street and drove into the night.

At the first red light, Kyouya took a breath.

“I’m...sorry,” he told Tamaki. “About your birthday.”

“It’s okay.”

Kyouya furrowed his eyebrows. He sent a sidelong glance at Tamaki. “That was fast,” he muttered. Something stirred in him, something tense and uncomfortable.

Tamaki flipped the small vents of the car heaters toward his face. “Well,” he said, his voice surprisingly calm, “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking the past few days.” He flicked blue eyes back to Kyouya. “And this is what you wanted to talk about, right?”

_Of course it is, you dolt._

Kyouya looked back at the road. “Define ‘thinking.’”

Tamaki rubbed his hands in front of the heater. “I was just evaluating how I feel about sex in general, and that maybe it’s a result of...hm.” He paused. “Maybe I should go further back than that.”

Kyouya signaled for his next left. “Go back as far as you want.”

Tamaki took a breath. “I lived with my mother until I was 14,” he explained. “Although she wasn’t the one to go into the details of the birds and bees with me, we did talk about things like love and marriage. Her affair with my father while he was married was the reason our family couldn’t be together. So she wanted to stress on me that I shouldn’t have sex until I’m married, because that way I’ll have everyone’s blessing and any babies I have won’t be outside the family like I am.”

Kyouya didn’t say anything. He just signaled for his next turn.

“Anyway, I thought she was right, and I _still_ think she’s right. I want to get married, sleep with my wife on our wedding night, have kids we can love together, and just have a normal family.

“But I also know how hard that’s going to be in my case. I can’t marry someone my family doesn’t approve of and all that, so it’s probably going to be a long time before I can even think of getting married. But in the meantime, biology kicked in for me a few years ago, and it’s getting harder and harder to ignore it.”

Tamaki was silent a moment. “I thought about what you were saying before,” he said quietly. “About those girls at those parties. About how there’s a difference between sleeping with someone and just, y’know, fooling around. And when I started thinking about it like that, I started to understand how you could be so logical about sex.” Tamaki sighed. “You can go halfway on it. I’d never really thought of that.”

Kyouya swallowed. There was an unsettled feeling, like a meal sitting oddly, that hardened at the pit of his stomach. Although the words Tamaki said made sense, they didn’t sound right coming from his mouth.

Tamaki rubbed his shoes together. “This is a little personal, Kyouya, but...I do touch myself sometimes. Not a lot, but sometimes. And it usually just makes me feel lonelier when I’m done. I’d never considered...sorta...touching myself with someone else.”

“With a girl?” Kyouya asked evenly. Tamaki wasn’t specifying, and that was disturbing.

Tamaki frowned. “To be honest,” he said quietly, “other than Haruhi, I don’t feel like I really trust any particular girl. And Haruhi still makes me uncomfortable for a lot of reasons, mostly because I’m still thinking about marriage and babies whenever I look at her. And I...I kinda think things should stay that way with her, because I am really serious about her.”

Tamaki sighed and ran a hand through his bangs. “Am I making sense anymore? I guess, just...if sex is one thing, and touching someone is another, then I think the sex should be with someone you’re serious about and the touching should be with someone you’re comfortable with. And I’m comfortable with...well, I’m most comfortable with you, Kyouya. And when I realized that, the other night didn’t seem like the end of the world like I thought it was.”

Kyouya’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. And it wasn’t just the words--it was the fact that Tamaki was saying them.

_What the hell happened since Friday?_ Kyouya wondered in alarm, his mind narrowing on the idea and blocking out all others. He stole a quick glance at the passenger’s seat. Tamaki was slumped a little in the leather, his eyes fixated on the dashboard, but he _seemed_ mostly normal. Like he had over the phone. Like he had when he’d laughed after letting himself into the car.

It was Tamaki, but it wasn’t. Kyouya didn’t know what to think.

“Are you gay?” he asked abruptly.

Tamaki gave a start. “What? No, Kyouya...no. Weren’t you listening to me? I’m serious about girls. I’m not attracted to boys. This isn’t about attraction, it’s about comfort levels and trust and...weren’t you listening to me?” Tamaki frowned, his voice taking on an irritated edge. “Am I _gay._ God...to be honest, the thought hasn’t crossed my mind since that night in the club. And even then, it was only for, like, a second, and was mostly just because I was trying to process what happened.”

_It didn’t cross his mind,_ Kyouya thought darkly.

But it had crossed Kyouya’s. It had crossed the back of his mind many, many times, even if he hadn’t dwelled on it, even if he hadn’t acknowledged it. It was that thick, sickening sludge that stained his days and suffocated him at night.

_It didn’t cross Tamaki’s mind._ And that was just further proof of how naive Tamaki was.

“Tamaki,” Kyouya said at last, his words very careful. “However you want to think about it, I’m still sorry it happened. And we don’t have to talk about it anymore after this. All right?”

Tamaki sniffed. “I don’t _mind_ talking about it,” he murmured. “I think it’s healthy to talk about it.”

“Do you honestly believe that?”

“Yes, I honestly believe that!” Tamaki’s voice rose in volume. “I know this is all really awkward, Kyouya, but we’re friends--and friends don’t ignore each other when something weird happens! God, I was starting to think you’d _never_ contact me.”

Kyouya scowled. “You could’ve tried contacting _me._ ”

“Yeah, right. After you stormed off on my birthday? You were so quiet and mad that I was afraid you’d...I didn’t know _what_ was wrong with you. I didn’t know if you were mad at me, even. So I just left you alone.”

“I realized what we did was a _mistake_ , Tamaki, and I regretted it. I was trying to give us space so we could later come back and repair our relationship.”

“Since when does avoiding me repair our relationship?!” Tamaki sat up. “And if you wanted space, you could’ve said so instead of giving me the silent treatment!”

Kyouya gritted his teeth. “Subtlety is clearly lost on you, but I don’t know why I’m surprised.”

“There are times and places for subtlety, Kyouya, but right after you stick your hand in my pants isn’t one of them!” Tamaki threw himself against the back of the seat. “You can be so frustrating, you know that?! I know you don’t like talking about everything, but you should’ve talked to me about this. I’ve been lying awake at night waiting for you to call me. If you’d spent thirty seconds thinking about the situation other than the stupid ‘are we gay’ question, you would’ve realized that you were making me completely miserable and making our relationship _harder_ to fix!”

Kyouya took a long, shuddering breath. He needed a cigarette. Now. At the next red light he shoved his hand into his pocket and awkwardly pulled a stick free of its box, but he didn’t have time to light it before the light changed again.

“Shit,” he grunted, pushing the cigarette between his lips. He thought it would help him, even unlit, but it didn’t.

Tamaki was silent for a moment. Finally, he sighed. He pulled the cigarette lighter out of its home beneath the car’s CD player.

“Here.” He held out the plastic and metal bud and held down its handle.

Kyouya quickly held the tip against the lighter, but he had to turn the steering wheel, causing him to pull away. Tamaki plucked the cigarette from him and lit it himself.

Kyouya suddenly felt the anger drain out of him. When Tamaki gently pushed the lit cigarette between Kyouya’s lips, a thick sense of guilt filled Kyouya. Tamaki didn’t deserve to be treated like he was being treated.

_“You know I hate it when you smoke.”_

_“Kyouya, what’re you...”_

_“I didn’t know if you were mad at me, even.”_

Kyouya felt very tired. With a sense of defeat, he pulled out the car’s ashtray and slowly rubbed out his new cigarette into it.

“Tamaki,” he said quietly.

Tamaki said nothing, but Kyouya could feel his discomfort. Kyouya sighed.

This was all so stupid. It was _so stupid._ Kyouya had made a mistake, and Tamaki wanted to deal with it, and Kyouya was fleeing like a coward. Kyouya had only felt like a coward once before in his life--the time Tamaki had confronted him about his own inferiority complex all those years ago. Their relationship had come full-circle.

_Great,_ he thought miserably. Although it was probably a good thing that Kyouya humiliating himself tended to bring them together, that didn’t make Kyouya feel much better about the whole thing.

“I’m sorry,” Kyouya said quietly. “Really, Tamaki.”

Tamaki sighed. “You already apologized.”

“I’m emphasizing that apology, then. I shouldn’t have...fooled around with you at the club. It was stupid.”

Tamaki ran a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t just your doing,” he said quietly. “We were both involved.”

Kyouya could feel irritation welling up in his chest again. “Would you just accept my apology?” he muttered. “It was stupid, I started it, and it’ll never happen again. Okay?”

Tamaki was silent.

Kyouya glanced over at Tamaki. “Okay?” he repeated, this time with more emphasis. “We’re talking about it, right? Just like you want. Now let’s finish the talking.”

Tamaki looked lost in thought. Kyouya was about to say something sarcastic, but then a concept struck him and he suddenly froze.

His mind traced back 30 seconds to what he had just said.

_Oh, shit._

“Tamaki,” he said quickly, trying to look at the blond while keeping his eyes on the road. “Is it something I said?”

Tamaki audibly swallowed.

Kyouya could feel the dull thundering of his heart in his ears. “Was it...” He took a breath. “Was it...the part about it never happening again?”

Tamaki said nothing, but he did move. He slowly, uncomfortably, sank down in his seat and buried the bottom half of his face in his high-zipped jacket. In the shafts of light that sliced through the car window, Kyouya saw the faintest hint of flushed cheeks.

_Shit. Shit!_

Kyouya’s pulse began to race. He gripped the steering wheel harder, the sweat on his palms causing a hot lubrication. What the hell was going on? What the _hell_ was wrong with Tamaki?! Was he really so much of a naïve, sex-crazed virgin that he would find any sex--even _jerking off another boy_ \--a good idea?!

Kyouya wanted to reach over, grab Tamaki by his coat, and shake him as hard as he could. Tamaki could be stupid and even painfully blind, but this was new for him. He had never put his dick ahead of his sense of propriety.

“I thought about what you were saying before...about how there’s a difference between sleeping with someone and just, y’know, fooling around.”

Kyouya swallowed hard.Tamaki’s justification was coming from Kyouya’s own argument. They’d come to different conclusions, obviously, but the reasoning was the same. Kyouya couldn’t believe that Tamaki, poster child for romance and marriage, was breaking down sex into numbers the way Kyouya did.

But...it wasn’t sex. Not really.

They hadn’t had sex.

They wouldn’t have sex.

And Kyouya wasn’t gay. Tamaki had insisted he wasn’t gay, either. What was it Tamaki had said? That jerking off was about comfort and not attraction? Masturbation alone wasn’t about attraction, after all...

Despite himself, despite every ounce of resistance that screamed through his brain, Kyouya felt that strange sensation come over him again. It was that sense of being...resigned. He’d felt it at the club, but he’d attributed it to the alcohol at the time. Perhaps it was something more emotional, more fundamental than intoxication? _Natural_ intoxication, maybe?

Kyouya’s brain wanted to fight it, but the rest of him didn’t. It was like all his pent-up frustration suddenly melted down inside him into some kind of strange, coiling warmth in the pit of his stomach. His mind went clear, and, after another minute, his reservations finally disappeared. He lost the desire to fight at all.

He felt the blood drain from his head and to his groin.

He rolled to a stop at the next red light and turned to Tamaki. Tamaki looked back awkwardly, his eyes blinking a bit more than was necessary from his position deep in his seat. The two boys remained like that a moment, completely silent.

Maybe it was that comfort Tamaki had mentioned--maybe that was what Kyouya felt. There was also something hard at the pit of Kyouya’s stomach in the center of all that swirling warmth, something that _didn’t_ feel so positive...but it seemed to do nothing more than strengthen his sudden desire.

Kyouya flipped his turn signal to the right arrow.

Tamaki swallowed. “The...corner with all the food places is to your left,” he murmured, pointing out Kyouya’s window.

Kyouya glanced quickly into the rearview mirror as he drove out of the line waiting at the red light. “Push back your seat,” he ordered.

Tamaki froze. Kyouya turned down a side street and drove several blocks in, the lights of the city fading into the calm, quiet darkness of residential housing for the rich. A few cars were parallel parked in front of lawns, but most of the thin road was open and empty.

Tamaki shakily reached under his seat. He pulled the lever and jammed his chair back as far as it would go, the action taking him a few tries because his legs couldn’t find a trembling purchase on the floor.

Blood rushing in his ears, Kyouya pulled up in front of a house with no signs of life. He put the car in park, unbuckled his seatbelt, and deftly swung his long legs over the car’s stick and cup holder so he could straddle Tamaki in the passenger’s seat.

He kissed Tamaki hard, his mind temporarily brushing off the idea that kissing was a bit more intimate than he wanted to get with a male friend. But Kyouya rather liked tonguing, and Tamaki seemed to feel the same, based on the high-pitched moans he made when Kyouya’s tongue snaked inside his mouth. Tamaki was much more with it this time around, his lips finding rough purchase over and over with Kyouya’s, his hands shakily moving up to Kyouya’s shoulders and digging in with significant force.

Kyouya abruptly yanked back and pulled off his glasses, his fingers folding them as he awkwardly crammed them in the small storage space beneath the CD player. He could hear and feel Tamaki panting under him, but he didn’t want to look at him--Kyouya wanted to distinctly separate the physical from the friendship, because that was the only way he could imagine their situation working. Neither one of them was gay, right? They were both just letting off some steam. So when Kyouya pushed his tongue into Tamaki’s mouth again and the two of them made out like the frustrated teenagers they were, Kyouya took advantage of the privacy of a dark car, no glasses, and closed eyes to start fantasizing about a girl.

_“Kyouya-kun...has anyone told you how handsome you are?”_

Kyouya’s mind drifted back to the tall model he’d met at a black-tie event some time before. She’d probably been five years his senior and she’d never done more than run her hand up his thigh at dinner, but he’d caught a hint of hot red lingerie peeking out from between her legs when she crossed them; he’d jerked off to that memory for days. Her long, somewhat angular body wasn’t far from the body that now squirmed below him.

“Nngh.” Kyouya grunted and ground his crotch against Tamaki’s flat stomach, trying to imagine small breasts crushed against him. The thick taste of lip balm that coated his tongue when he sucked on Tamaki’s lower lip began to taste like lipstick.

Kyouya could feel Tamaki frantically upzip his jacket and try to squirm out of it. Kyouya grabbed the jacket with both hands and nearly tore it down Tamaki’s shoulders, which happened to jerk Tamaki’s hands off Kyouya and lock them down by the bottom of the seat. While Tamaki tried to free his hands from the tangle of windbreaker, Kyouya pushed up the bottom of Tamaki’s shirt and ground his jeans against Tamaki’s bare navel.

“Mmph!” Tamaki moaned, his flat stomach instinctively curling away from the cold air of the car and Kyouya’s aggressive erection. Kyouya just pushed the lower half of his body closer and kept grinding against that rectangle of bare skin.

_“Mmm...right there, Kyouya-kun...I like it hard, baby.”_

Kyouya’s lips dragged in a nearly bruising path down Tamaki’s chin and along his jaw, finally stopping at the pulsepoint of Tamaki’s neck. As he sucked on the slight bulge of Tamaki’s tonsil through his skin, Tamaki gasped and jerked until he freed one of his wrists from his jacket. By that point Kyouya was humping him hard, his knees tight around Tamaki’s waist, the hard erection in his jeans ramming against Tamaki’s navel in an unwitting and poor imitation of fucking a hole through clothing.

Tamaki grabbed one of Kyouya’s knees with his free hand. “K-Kyouya!” he gasped. “I can’t...ow!”

Although his brain had become a muddled mess of sexual fantasy and endorphins, Kyouya registered the uncomfortable struggling under him. He stopped sucking on Tamaki’s neck and blearily reached under the seat; when he pulled the appropriate handle, the seat back fell hard with the weight of the two of them, setting them nearly horizontal and knocking about three seconds of sense into them both.

Tamaki freed his other hand. “I can’t...” he breathed again, jerking his hips a bit under Kyouya. He grabbed the window frame and tried to pull his body into a better position.

That was when Kyouya realized he was practically sitting on Tamaki’s stomach. He dug his knee into the flat panel that held the car’s gearshift and swiftly scooted his hips down.

_“Fuck me, baby.”_

Kyouya grabbed one of Tamaki’s shins and pulled it into the air by his head, sending Tamaki deeper into the seat with a cry. Kyouya jammed himself between Tamaki’s spread legs and ground their erections together, cutting off Tamaki’s gasps with his mouth.

Closer to a missionary position now and with his erection fully stiff, Kyouya fucked against Tamaki slowly, soaking in the feeling of hard, constant contact against his fevered sex. Although there were layers of stifling fabric between Kyouya’s penis and the outside, there were also layers of fabric over Tamaki’s, making it easier for Kyouya to forget that he was humping dick. He focused on driving the toes of his sneakers against the faux-carpet flooring of the car and grinding his pelvis against the warm crotch underneath him.

Tamaki moaned with each thrust, his voice increasing slightly in pitch. One of his hands still gripped the window frame for support, but the other gripped one of Kyouya’s forearms, both of which dug into the car seat on either side of Tamaki’s head. His fingers clawed at Kyouya’s splayed hand, but Kyouya batted aside the attempt at touching hands. Tamaki instead reached between them and pushed Kyouya’s shirt up his chest.

_“Fuck me!”_

When his abdomen and stomach were revealed to the cold air of the car, he dropped more of his weight on Tamaki to push their revealed stomachs together. The feeling of skin rubbing on skin, their newly beading sweat forming a slick layer between them, made Kyouya groan as he fucked harder. Tamaki blurted some sort of half-gasp against Kyouya’s lips.

The air in the car was cold against the back of his neck, but Kyouya was too hot in his clothes. Sweaty hands slid up the back of his shirt, sliding over the lower muscles that contracted and released with each thrust. Kyouya was so delirious that he practically felt long red nails scraping down his skin. His wanted those hands to push down into his jeans.

He dragged his mouth from Tamaki’s and instead pushed his forehead against the back of the seat, focusing all his strength on pounding as hard and as fast as possible. The hands on his back slid up to under his arms, bunching fabric up under his chin and bringing his bare chest in contact with a tee-shirt over a chest that he barely acknowledged as being flat. He felt a heartbeat thunder wildly against his own.

“Nngh! Kyouya...I’m gonna...cum...!”

Someone tapped on the car window.

The sudden noise was like a slap to the back of Kyouya’s head. As Tamaki cried out in alarm and jerked in surprise under him, Kyouya’s foot slipped, sending him crushing against the door. His elbow came in contact with the automatic window switch on the panel.

With slow, painful surety, the fogged-up window went down with an electrical hum. A blinding light flooded in with the cold air, causing Kyouya to recoil. He was too disoriented to know what was going on.

“Everything okay in here?” came an adult male voice. “If it’s hanky-panky you want, you can’t do it on a public...oh.”

Cold fear closed around Kyouya’s heart as reality sank back in.

_Shit,_ his mind spun. _Shit. Where are my glasses? **Shit.**_ Kyouya reached blindly under the car’s CD player, fumbling to pull out his glasses as he crawled back into the driver’s seat. He crammed the glasses onto his face as he pulled down his bunched-up shirt, blinking away the spots caused by the bright light as he heard Tamaki hastily fix his clothes.

There was a police officer outside his window. The look of mild confusion and slight disgust on his face spoke volumes.

Kyouya froze. His entire life until that moment flashed before his eyes, followed up by grim fantasies of the future. A criminal record. An expulsion from school. His father’s backhand across his face, his brother’s sneers, his sister crying, the family kicking him out and sending him to live with relatives on the furthest side of the ocean until the end of time.

He wanted to think of something to say to get himself out of this, but he couldn’t. His thoughts were completely arrested.

As was he. _Shit,_ was all he could muster. _Shit shit shit shit shit **shit!**_

“We’re sorry,” Tamaki suddenly blurted, his hands shaky as he pushed himself upright in the lowered seat. He ran a hand over his disheveled hair. “W-we’re really...sorry, officer. We didn’t mean to...uh...”

Kyouya stared at Tamaki dumbly. Still unable to form a coherent sentence, he looked back at the policeman.

The police officer sighed, pausing to rub at his temples. After a few seconds that felt like an eternity, he leaned his forearms against the window frame and ducked his head slightly into the car.

“Look,” he murmured, his glance darting to Tamaki before Kyouya. “What you boys do in your free time is your business, but you can’t conduct acts of lewdness in a public street--even if the car is yours. It’s against the law.”

Tamaki audibly swallowed. “We’re sorry,” he offered again, considerably weaker.

The police officer pulled back. “I’ll let you off with a warning this time,” he grunted. “Now go to a hotel or...think of your mothers and go home, will ya? What would they say if they saw you like this?”

The police officer muttered something to himself as he walked away. The sound of a car starting up broke through the air a moment later, and then the slow blur of headlights streaked across Kyouya’s fogged windshield as the police officer did a k-turn in the street before driving away.

For a full minute, neither of them said anything. Kyouya stared blankly out the windshield, its edges slowly clearing as cold air breathed in through the window. Tamaki shivered as he pulled his seat back up; after putting his jacket back on, he flipped the window switch once more. The window rose and then closed with a very final _thwoomp._

Still, silence. And then Tamaki sighed.

“That was really lucky,” he murmured.

The spoken sentence seemed to break some sort of embargo on Kyouya’s speech. Kyouya grunted and rubbed a fist against his eye, afterward adjusting his glasses more properly on his face.

“Damn straight,” he muttered. He turned the key in the ignition.

As the car revved to life and the heaters blasted cooled air at them, Kyouya and Tamaki turned and met eyes.

It was...strange. Tamaki was always so neat with his appearance, his wavy hair carefully combed and his clothes freshly pressed. But there he sat in Kyouya’s car, his hair disheveled, his jacket unzipped and his designer tee-shirt wrinkled, the collar of the shirt clearly overstretched and ruined during the creation of the blotchy red hickey under the edge of his jaw. He furrowed his eyebrows and frowned, a mixture of embarrassment and disappointment swirling in his blue eyes.

Without thinking, Kyouya’s eyes dropped to Tamaki’s groin. Although Tamaki’s erection had clearly lessened, there was still a small bulge behind the denim’s zipper. It took a moment for Kyouya to connect the slightly painful strain in his own pants to his own not-completely-deflated erection.

_Well,_ the logical side of his brain argued, completely out of place in the bizarre haze of his mind, _you were both so close to climax, it’ll take time to settle down._

And for some reason, the fear and uncertainty drained out of Kyouya again--like it had shortly before he’d straddled Tamaki in his seat. Kyouya let out the breath he’d unwittingly held and closed his eyes.

It was gone. His horror was gone, replaced with odd normalcy. The only feeling that swirled through his veins was the oxymoronic calm and excitement that was the clear result of sex. He was in an altered state, surely, but it wasn’t alcohol and it was only partially the sexual endorphins. Maybe it was the comfort that Tamaki had spoken of--the familiarity of the blond boy that sat in his car coupled with the excitement of experimentation and solidified by the trust they shared. Maybe it was the fact that the consequences that Kyouya had feared so deeply had gotten painfully close and then driven away into the night, reduced in seriousness by a strange man simply shaking his head in disappointment.

Or maybe it was none of those things. Maybe it was the danger, or the freedom, or the slowly blooming pain of his erection. Or maybe it was even more negative than that.

But Kyouya discovered that he didn’t care. Once again he turned off his mind as he pulled the gearshift into “drive.”

“We should...go,” Tamaki said quietly. “Like the police officer said. He was right, and...yeah.”

Kyouya took a breath. “He _was_ right,” he agreed as he flipped his signal. “And we’ll do what he said.”

Tamaki was silent as Kyouya pulled back into the street and drove deeper into the dark road surrounded by houses. When he reconnected to a major street, he signaled to the left.

Even in the dark, Kyouya saw Tamaki glance at him from the corner of his eye. And he _heard_ Tamaki, too, as the blond sank back into his chair and pushed his fists into his jacket pockets.

“We’re not...following his advice about our mothers, are we?” he asked. But he spoke the question like a statement, as if he knew the answer even as he asked it.

Kyouya turned the steering wheel. “No,” he said evenly. “We’re getting a room.”


	3. Hotel

Kyouya only needed about 10 seconds. He quickly stepped into the room after Tamaki, transferred the "Do Not Disturb" sign from the inside doorknob to the outside doorknob, and shut the door with the care of someone who wanted to be doubly sure his exit was locked.

There was a click behind him, and the room was flooded with light.

“It’s...nice,” he heard Tamaki say. “Although the windows are a little--”

But Kyouya had no patience for Tamaki’s feeble attempt at small talk. He grabbed Tamaki with both hands and slammed the blond against the wall.

Tamaki didn’t bother trying to finish his sentence. Kyouya crammed his mouth against Tamaki’s, his tangling tongue and gnashing teeth even more aggressive than in the car. Tamaki made some sort of a muffled grunt and winced; Kyouya adjusted the angle of his mouth and bit with his lips rather than his teeth.

_You’re hungry, baby._

Kyouya’s sexual fantasy of that model was vaguer than it had been earlier, but he still tried to hold on to it. The light in the room wasn’t helping. He batted at the light switch with a free hand until he finally managed to shut it off. The boys were plunged in darkness once more.

Kyouya sucked on Tamaki’s tongue as he fumbled with the button on his own jeans. After he managed to undo his fly, he nearly tore the button off Tamaki’s jeans trying to do the same. He grabbed one of Tamaki’s hands and crammed it down his underwear, then shoved both of his own hands down Tamaki’s pants.

“Mmm!” Tamaki’s back arched, slamming the back of his head against the wall. Kyouya ignored Tamaki’s squirms and simply started working Tamaki’s stiffening erection with both of his palms.

_Touch me,_ the girl in Kyouya’s mind begged. But her voice was fading...the dick in Kyouya’s hands made it harder for him to fantasize about a female.

But Kyouya had gone in and out of arousal for more than thirty minutes. His lack of climax had made him antsy, frustrated, and so strained it ached. He needed to cum. Fast. He barely cared what he was doing; he just pumped and gripped Tamaki’s erection the way Kyouya needed his own erection pumped.

Unfortunately, he swiftly discovered that the better he jerked off Tamaki, the worse Tamaki returned the favor. Within a minute Tamaki was gasping against Kyouya’s lips, the strength drained from his fingers as he leaned the back of his head against the wall.

“K-Kyouya--”

“Dammit,” Kyouya snarled as he stopped what he was doing and pulled one of his hands free. He grabbed Tamaki’s free hand and ran a tongue back and forth over the palm. Tamaki stared at him, panting, his half-lidded eyes a pale blue shine in the dark.

“What’re you...nnn.” Tamaki squirmed and bit his lip as Kyouya’s tongue ran between his fingers.

Kyouya took Tamaki’s now-wet hand and pushed it into his own pants. He furrowed his eyebrows and closed his eyes, closing Tamaki’s slick hand over his dick and guiding it through a few slow, hard strokes. He then fumbled with Tamaki’s other hand until he had it delicately gripping his testicles.

“Give me a proper fucking handjob,” Kyouya growled, “or I’m sticking my dick in your mouth.”

Tamaki swallowed. He shakily followed Kyouya’s implied instructions, which finally--albeit slowly--gave Kyouya the kind of sensation he needed. Kyouya leaned his forehead against the wall over Tamaki’s shoulder and breathed heavily.

_Cum, baby. I’m gonna make you cum._

Kyouya gritted his teeth. Tamaki’s hands were hot and wet and smooth. Kyouya blearily made a moan that seemed high-pitched to his ears, his forehead scratching against the tiny bumps of hotel wallpaper. He panted into Tamaki’s ear.

“Good...good, _nn._ ” He started to pump Tamaki’s erection again. “H...harder.”

Tamaki whimpered and tensed against Kyouya, his hands taking rougher grips. Kyouya buried his nose in Tamaki’s hair, his open, panting mouth filling with a few blond strands. He smelled shampoo and sweat. The dick in his hands was pulsing with heat. The body crammed against him was breathing hard and shaking with the jerks of palms and fingers.

The sparks of orgasm started to tingle in Kyouya’s groin. The skin at the base of Kyouya’s abdomen was stretched tight, his testicles tense and retracting under his quivering erection.

“Uhnn.” Kyouya’s knee ground into the wall beside Tamaki’s leg. The pressure hurt, but his body was tensing with the aggression of release. He wanted to fuck something, but Tamaki’s hands were already fucking him.

Tamaki’s hands.

Fucking him.

_Don’t think about Tamaki!_

With his subconscious furious with his paralyzed imagination, Kyouya nonetheless failed to imagine anything feminine. He was just aware, acutely, that he was crammed with Tamaki against a hotel wall as they jerked each other off.

“ _Fuck!_ ”

Kyouya came hard, his entire pelvis thrusting in and up, crushing the mess of his dick and Tamaki’s hands against Tamaki’s navel. He couldn’t stop gasping as his hips bucked with the release. He realized after a few seconds of his orgasm that Tamaki was still hard in his hands; he jerked as frantically as he could, not wanting to be left to a cock after the intoxicating rush of sex wore off.

Luckily, Tamaki came a moment later. He arched against Kyouya and squealed like a girl.

As Tamaki’s erection quivered in Kyouya’s hand and spurted semen against Kyouya’s jeans, the final vestiges of urgency drained away. Kyouya’s mind began to clear. He felt the darkness of the hotel room and his situation close in on him.

He swallowed.

_Shit._

Kyouya closed his eyes to calm himself. _Don’t dwell on this,_ he thought.

Kyouya knew that if he tried to break down exactly the decisions he’d made that night and why he’d made them, he’d end up in a mental clusterfuck that wouldn’t help anything. He was already in the room. He’d already cum once. There was no turning back.

He took a deep breath and emptied his mind as best he could. When he pulled his sticky hands free of Tamaki’s boxers, Tamaki moaned. The blond leaned up against Kyouya, the action slowed by post-coital lethargy. He rested his temple on Kyouya’s shoulder.

Kyouya sighed. Tamaki hung on him like an overgrown child. “Let go,” Kyouya murmured.

Then, to Kyouya’s surprise, Tamaki pressed a small, gentle kiss on Kyouya’s collarbone.

An uncontrollable shudder ran through Kyouya. He pulled away abruptly, leaving Tamaki to stumble to a firmer standing position on his own.

“Don’t...don’t do that,” he hissed.

Tamaki was still lethargic. “Hmm?” he hummed with half-lidded eyes.

Kyouya didn’t want to elaborate. Hell, he felt that he shouldn’t _have_ to elaborate. He ignored Tamaki and made his way to the bathroom, his hand fumbling for the glasses he’d crammed into his back pocket. He slid the glasses back on his face as he slapped the bathroom’s light switch.

Light flooded the small room, making Kyouya squint his eyes. He blinked carefully as he turned on the sink faucet.

He was a bit disheveled, according to his reflection; his jacket was unzipped, his shirt was wrinkled, and his bangs were somewhat plastered to his forehead with sweat. It was the flush to his face that was the most unusual, though...Kyouya wasn’t used to seeing color under his skin after something that wasn’t exercise.

Well...he _had_ been physically active. But for how long? It hadn’t felt like more than a few minutes against the wall. As he washed the sweat and semen off his hands and dabbed a damp towel against his jeans, Kyouya started to wonder if he always got so flushed after sexual exertion.

Perhaps he’d looked juvenile and overworked to the girls he’d performed with. The thought was unsettling.

“Hello?”

Kyouya’s thoughts were interrupted with the sound of Tamaki’s voice from the room. He didn’t feel like answering, but it turned out that he didn’t need to.

“Yeah, it’s me. I just wanted to say I’m not coming home tonight...yeah, I’m out with a friend, and school doesn’t start for a few more days. I’ll call in the morning.”

_He’s on his cell._

Tamaki’s voice was a bit faded; it lacked his usual energy. Whichever family member or servant he called didn’t seem to care, though, as Tamaki only murmured another affirmative and a farewell before hanging up.

Kyouya paused. He gripped the edges of the sink and let the water stream from the faucet, causing a hollow sound as the water shot directly into the drain. He half-expected Tamaki to walk into the bathroom to say something, although he didn’t know why.

_I’m not coming home tonight._

They hadn’t discussed it, but it had been implied. Kyouya had raced past all the tacky, ridiculous love hotels in favor of a fancy business hotel his father had had dealings in. He had paid on his credit card and used his real name. When the woman behind the counter had asked if he wanted two beds, he had confirmed that.

But the fact of the matter was, Kyouya had no real plan. And Tamaki had simply followed him, silently obeying all of Kyouya’s orders. The back of Kyouya’s mind argued that if anyone asked any questions, he could simply say the two of them needed better privacy to study. Kyouya’s eldest brother had spent nights in hotels when pulling all-nighters during med school, after all.

Tamaki’s feet made quiet _pat_ noises on the carpeting outside the bathroom. There was a pause, the ruffling of clothes, and then the quiet squeak of bedsprings.

Kyouya closed his eyes. He finally reached out and turned off the faucet.

The bedroom was silent. After a moment, there was a small clicking noise, and then the quiet sounds of the television drifted through the bathroom’s open door.

Kyouya sighed. He pulled his box of cigarettes from his jacket pocket and shook a stick free. He slipped it between his lips before shedding his jacket and exchanging it for one of the two sleeping robes hanging from a bathroom hook. He closed the bathroom door and undressed, pausing to rub the wet towel under his arms and between his legs. He closed the robe over his naked body and tied the cotton belt.

When he finally left the bathroom and turned off the light, he was mostly in darkness once again. He lit his cigarette by the light of the TV.

Tamaki was in the further bed. He had gotten rid of his jacket and jeans at some point, and now lay in his tee-shirt and boxers. He was curled around a large pillow, his knees tucked up, the pristine white socks on his feet a match to the brilliant white pillowcase under them. His face was turned down to the TV; the flickering lights danced on his pale skin and lit up the distant look in his eyes.

Kyouya took a long drag on his cigarette. “Hey,” he called, tapping his ashes into the ashtray on a nearby counter. “I’m getting room service. Do you want something?”

Tamaki stirred slightly, but didn’t answer. He closed his eyes and shook his head.

Kyouya slipped the cigarette back between his lips and made his way to the room phone. He noticed the mini-bar below the counter that held it, and decided to eat an energy bar from there instead.

After eating something and drinking a canned coffee, Kyouya found that watching TV in silence from his own bed was getting annoying. It was odd, but Tamaki’s lack of constant talking and/or pestering was surreal to the point of being uncomfortable. Kyouya didn’t know what to make of it. It wasn’t that he _wanted_ to talk, of course...but the talking from the TV sounded hollow, and he wanted a bit of real sound to fill the air.

He glanced over at Tamaki, but the blond still hadn’t moved. In the light of the television, his eyes seemed to have glossed over a bit.

“Tamaki?”

Tamaki blinked once. The blue orbs rolled over to Kyouya.

Kyouya gestured to the bathroom. “You should wash up. There’s another robe in there.”

Tamaki closed his eyes for a second, then reluctantly shifted his feet to the floor so he could stand. He lurched to the bathroom slowly and closed the door behind him.

Once a shaft of light peeked out from under the doorway and was followed by the sound of running water, Kyouya got to his feet.

_I have to do something._

Kyouya’s fingers itched. His blood stirred. Although the frenetic urgency of pent-up lust no longer drove him, the post-orgasm nagging for _more_ was almost as bad. He wasn’t satisfied psychologically. Watching Tamaki watch TV in his boxers was both frustrating and stupid.

They had rented that room to fool around, right? Then they were going to fucking fool around.

Kyouya started pulling open drawers in the room. He found a bilingual Bible left by Mormon missionaries, the menu for room service, and a phonebook. There was a small drawer under the mini bar, so he tried opening that next.

It was the sex drawer. Kyouya stopped for a moment. In an abstract sort of way, he’d been looking for something like it to push him into the next move, but he was still a little surprised that such a drawer existed in a hotel that wasn’t specifically for sex. Nothing in the drawer was elaborate, but...

His eyes felled on the brightly packaged condoms.

He paused.

_We’re not having sex,_ he reminded himself sharply, and slammed shut the drawer.

He stood and fished another cigarette from his robe pocket. When he held up his lighter to it, he was surprised to see that his hands were shaking.

_K-Kyouya!_

Like several times before, his mind was suddenly flooded by Tamaki’s gasps. But now the audio memories were woven with snatches of visuals and tactile sensations he’d tried not to process--snatches that now floated like ghosts in his head.

_Kyouya!_

The way Tamaki had been crammed under Kyouya in that car seat. His disheveled hair and flushed cheeks. His wet hands, smooth like a girl’s. An open mouth, a bit lip.

Wrapped around that pillow in the dark with a faraway look in his eyes.

_I’m gonna...cum!_

Brightly colored condom wrappers.

_Kyouya!_

The sound of the toilet flushing crashed through Kyouya’s thoughts. Kyouya quickly regained his grip on the cigarette that had slid dangerously far down his fingers.

His heart thundering unusually hard in his chest, Kyouya swallowed and took a long drag. A TV schedule tucked under the room phone caught his eye. He slid it free and scanned it quickly.

Channel 81 was porn. Kyouya took a few quick puffs on his cigarette before rubbing it out in an ashtray, then grabbed the remote from Tamaki’s bed. After a moment to reflect, he went back to the sex drawer and quickly pulled out a bottle of lubricant.

He had managed to unlock the porn channel by the time Tamaki came out of the bathroom. Tamaki was rubbing his eyes, but stopped and furrowed his eyebrows when he noticed the TV.

“Uh...Kyouya?”

“Which do you want?” Kyouya asked as he highlighted the few choices on the screen with the remote buttons. “Straight stuff or girl on girl?”

“Straight stuff? What do you mean by...” Tamaki’s eyes widened. “Wait, did you unlock the porn channel?”

“I’m 18 and have a credit card, Tamaki. Don’t look so surprised.”

Tamaki went very quiet. Rather than wait for Tamaki to either make a decision or object, Kyouya selected the third option on the screen and pressed “enter.” He tossed the remote control back on the table.

The screen went blue for a moment, then opened to a pair of girls moaning in a bathtub. Kyouya could _feel_ Tamaki freeze up on the other side of the room.

But it was to be expected. His heart hardening a bit as his mind settled into resignation, Kyouya sent Tamaki a cool stare and gestured to his bed.

“Come here, Tamaki.”

Tamaki didn’t move for a moment, his eyes locked in almost morbid fascination on the TV. When he did look away, his cheeks were flushed and he seemed embarrassed, but he sat down beside Kyouya and cleared his throat.

“Um...is this what you meant by ‘girl on girl’?”

Kyouya slid another cigarette between his lips and lit up. “I figured there’s already enough cock in this room,” he muttered.

Tamaki glanced at the TV, then dropped his eyes again. “I don’t...really want to watch this,” he said quietly.

“Then don’t.” Kyouya took a long drag and leaned back against the headboard. He wasn’t a big fan of porn--he rarely watched the stuff himself, finding the fakeness of it all a bit insulting. But there was the animalistic part of him that didn’t need much to be aroused, and considering how his mind seemed to be working against him, he wanted to shut it off. Shutting down his brain meant it was the perfect time for porn.

“Ah! Ah! Ah!”

The high-pitched squealing of the women on the screen filled the quiet room. Tamaki was still looking away, but Kyouya could see how red Tamaki’s face was from the corner of his eye. Kyouya just smoked and waited.

“Ah! No! I...ah!”

Tamaki squirmed. He made an unsettled little murmur.

_Nngh!_

Kyouya angrily put out his cigarette and shut his eyes, focusing on the sounds of the girls. He yanked the glasses from his face and all but slammed them on the bedside table.

“Ah!”

_Ah!_

“ **Ah!** ”

_I’m gonna..._

“Kyouya,” Tamaki panted from beside him. “I-I can’t...”

Kyouya snarled and knocked Tamaki onto his back. Even in the dark he could see Tamaki’s glassy eyes and open mouth under him, and all it did was make him harder and angrier.

“Shut _up,_ ” Kyouya hissed. “Stop saying my fucking name.”

Tamaki swallowed. The sound of one of the girls faking an orgasm rippled from the TV.

“I’m...sorry?” Tamaki breathed, although he clearly didn’t know what he was apologizing for. He swallowed again as his eyes glazed over.

_Kyouya!_

Kyouya plunged his tongue into Tamaki’s mouth, almost as if the action could cut off Kyouya’s thoughts. Tamaki whimpered as they frenched, and the sound of the girls didn’t successfully drown it out.

_Kyouya!_

_Son of a bitch!_ Kyouya thought, especially angry that his brain was the one making him uncomfortable this time.

“Stop...thinking about me,” Kyouya growled as he panted between kisses. “Think about girls. Think about fucking.”

Tamaki licked saliva from his lips. “Why are you mad at me?” he breathed.

“I’m not mad!” Kyouya could feel aggression snaking through his veins and giving strength to his limbs. He straddled Tamaki’s thighs and crammed his bare toes into the bed, his fingers digging into the bed sheets so hard he nearly tore at his cuticles. He dragged his mouth from Tamaki’s lips to his chin and bit down hard.

“Ow!”

Kyouya ran his tongue over his own teeth marks in Tamaki’s skin, his eyes screwed shut and his ears trying to focus on the moans of females.

“Ah! No! Not there! Please!”

As the pornography got rougher, Kyouya felt his lust taking over. He knocked one of his knees between Tamaki’s to spread Tamaki’s legs. Kyouya grabbed one of Tamaki’s thighs and pushed it up, hearing the fabric of the robe shift down to Tamaki’s hips, letting Tamaki’s knee knock Kyouya’s hip as a girl’s would.

“Nngh...”

Tamaki’s legs, although angular, weren’t as masculine as Kyouya had feared. The thin layer of fine hairs was soft under Kyouya’s fingertips. Kyouya dug his fingers into the flesh.

“Ah! Ah!”

The porn was finally doing its job; Kyouya was isolating himself from the body below him even as he feminized it. His ears were focused more on the girls than on the noises coming out of Tamaki.

Fully erect and parked between a pair of legs, Kyouya was ready to get off. His hand fumbled around the bed by Tamaki’s head until he found the bottle of lubricant he’d dropped at some point.

Kyouya pulled free of Tamaki’s lips and sat back. As he jerkily unscrewed the bottle’s cap and coated his hands in lube, he noticed that Tamaki’s eyes were shut tight, a look of unusual concentration creasing the skin on his brow.

He was fantasizing.

_Finally,_ Kyouya thought, a strange relief flooding him as he saw evidence of Tamaki’s distance.

Tamaki’s lips moved slightly as he murmured something to himself. The valley between his eyebrows grew shallower as he took deep breaths. When Kyouya pushed open Tamaki’s robe and grabbed his erection with a lubed hand, Tamaki arched and cried out something in another language.

_Was that...French?_

Tamaki fumbled for Kyouya’s erection without opening his eyes. Kyouya slathered Tamaki’s clutching hand with lubricant and brought it down on his own dick.

“ _Je vous adore, ma compagne impérissable._ ”

Kyouya grunted as Tamaki began to jerk. _About time,_ Kyouya thought with a hint of irritation. Since Tamaki didn’t need as much instruction this time around, Kyouya was able to keep himself propped up on one elbow while one free hand went to work on Tamaki’s cock.

But Tamaki wouldn’t stop talking. His eyes remained shut tight as he stayed locked in his fantasy, and the string of words that occasionally overlapped with Kyouya’s textbook learning began to overpower the moaning girls in Kyouya’s ears and mind.

_“Votre cheveux soyeux touchent mon visage, votre levrés sont doux...”_

Despite himself, Kyouya felt color flood to his face. For whatever reason, Tamaki’s French was embarrassing him.

He dipped down his head and squashed his mouth against Tamaki’s, momentarily stopping the words as their tongues entwined. But Tamaki’s breathing grew heavier, his jerks grew stronger, and a cache of buried confidence seemed to strengthen his resolve.

_“Je t’adore,”_ he breathed in-between their kisses. _“Je t’adore, ma cher.”_

“I know what that _means_ ,” Kyouya snapped before biting down on Tamaki’s lower lip.

“Mmgh!” Tamaki shook his head free and ran a tongue over his lower lip. “Stop biting me!” he complained, in Japanese this time.

Kyouya licked the edge of Tamaki’s mouth, then ran his tongue to Tamaki’s ear. He bit down harder on the earlobe and felt a rush of lust with Tamaki’s cry.

One of the girls squealed on the TV. With heat surging to his groin as Tamaki fondled him, Kyouya chewed on Tamaki’s earlobe as his orgasm bloomed. It was bigger this time, hot and heavy and sending a tingling rush out to his fingertips and toes. Kyouya felt himself groan against his will as the bed creaked.

“Yes,” he moaned, his pelvis thrusting forward into Tamaki’s hands. “Yes... _yes_...”

Tamaki pumped faster, which made Kyouya gasp. Kyouya suddenly felt weak as all the blood in his body rushed to his penis. He grew lightheaded with lust. He dropped his forehead to the sheets, unable to do anything but pant.

“Yes,” he groaned as he crushed his face into the stiff sheets. “Fuck...yes...!”

Kyouya couldn’t believe what he was doing. He wasn’t usually noisy in bed, but for some reason he couldn’t stop the sounds coming out of him. At least the fog over his mind kept him from caring much. The sounds were only arousing him further--the girls crying out from the TV, Tamaki’s breathing, the ruffling sheets, the creaking bedsprings. And hearing himself make sex noises only fed into Kyouya’s undiscriminating lust.

Tamaki’s fingers rubbed hard over the ridge of Kyouya’s penis. Kyouya’s gasping went high-pitched as one of the girls screamed from their porn. Kyouya dug his fingertips into the sheets.

“Ah...ah...!”

_Shut up!_ his mind berated in mild horror. But he still moaned and cried out, the pleasure pushing the sound up his throat. Cumming earlier was making his erection last, letting the heat in his groin reach new peaks he’d never experienced. He felt the tingling of his orgasm in every extremity--like his entire body, and not just his dick, was ready for release.

It was overpowering. His heart seized in his chest in instinctual fear.

“Fuck...ah...me...ah!”

Out of nowhere, Tamaki’s lips opened against Kyouya’s neck. A hot tongue flicked out, and then Tamaki very lightly bit down on Kyouya’s flesh.

_“Haah!”_ Kyouya choked as his body went taut and stars exploded behind his eyelids. His jaw dropped as he came, filling his mouth with hotel bed sheets as sensations burst through his body and caused him to buck uncontrollably. He forgot how to breathe. He forgot where he was. All that existed for him was the orgasm that tried to tear him out through his skin.

And then it was over. The energy suddenly dropped from Kyouya’s limbs, and he barely managed to keep himself propped on shaking elbows and knees. He gasped a few times, blinking his eyes in the dark as sweat-soaked bangs clung to the edges of his eyelashes.

_Shit._

Embarrassment tickled at the edge of Kyouya’s brain, but he was thankfully too tired to really feel it or care. He took a breath. Gathering every last ounce of strength he had, he rolled off of Tamaki and fell heavily to the sheets.

He lay there a moment, his eyes closed. It took him a minute to realize the room had gone strangely silent; the porn had ended at some point and returned to its blue screen, but he didn’t know when. Sleepiness dragged at his consciousness. Kyouya’s breathing slowed, filling the crumpled sheets around his face with languid, warmed air.

The bed creaked. Kyouya felt Tamaki move slowly by his side until there was the faint sound of wet skin hitting wet skin. Tamaki paused, and then he grunted slightly as the slapping of skin grew rhythmic.

Kyouya was too tired and too uninspired to offer to help. He fell asleep to the quiet moans of Tamaki masturbating.

 

**********************************

 

His phone was vibrating again.

Kyouya snorted. He took another drag off his cigarette as he watched the tiny phone shake its way noisily across the bedside table until it finally went still.

The screen lit up and beeped. Kyouya caught the words “5 messages” printed against the bright screen before it went dark.

Kyouya leaned back into the hotel room’s armchair. It was overstuffed to the point of discomfort, the paisley cover a disturbing mix of polyester and vinyl. He stubbed out his cigarette in the now-overflowing ashtray and uncrossed his legs.

Tamaki was still asleep and faced away in the further bed. His half-naked shoulders rose and fell with his breathing, the covers pulled up to rest chastely over his chest.

Kyouya watched him a moment. Then he slid another cigarette between his lips and lit up.

His phone started to vibrate again. When he glanced over this time, a new phone number lit up against the tiny screen.

Kyouya took a breath. He reached for the phone, flipped it open, and pressed it against his ear as he sucked on his cigarette.

“Hello?” he puffed out, allowing smoke to stream out of his mouth and nose.

“Kyouya!” his father snapped. “Why haven’t you been answering your sister’s calls?!”

Kyouya tapped his ashes into the ashtray. “I was asleep,” he answered. “I’m sorry...I guess I left my phone on vibrate.”

“Where on earth are you?!”

“At a hotel, sir. I wanted to study. I thought I told Nee-san.”

“You told her no such thing. We had a family meeting tonight and I needed you to be there!”

Feeling darkly emboldened, Kyouya took a pause to take a long drag and release off his cigarette. “I’m sorry for that,” he murmured, his voice thickened slightly with disdain. “I’ll keep my phone closer to the bedside next time.”

“Regardless, Kyouya. Your brother has a business meeting tomorrow and I want you to join him--he’s working out a merger I want you to learn about. Be home by 10 am sharp so you can be dressed and prepared in time.”

Kyouya blew smoke into his phone. “ _Yes,_ Father.”

The receiver on the other end clicked off. Kyouya snapped shut his phone as Tamaki stirred across the room.

“...Hmm?”

Tamaki murmured and shifted. The rumpled bed sheets twisted under him as he rolled over to face Kyouya. His hair was a mess, golden strands sticking out in every possible direction. He blinked his heavy lidded eyes and pushed his disheveled bangs out of his face.

“Were you just...talking to me?” he mumbled.

“No.” Kyouya took another drag. “Go back to sleep, Tamaki.”

Tamaki let a breath out of his nose. He blinked a few more times, then carefully lifted the sheet to see what was under it.

He winced. “Um,” he murmured, “I think I’ll just shower, actually.”

Kyouya said nothing. He just watched, somewhat intently, as Tamaki rolled his feet to the floor and pulled his robe back over his body. He lurched over to the bathroom as he rubbed his eyes. Right before opening the door, he glanced back at Kyouya.

Kyouya just stared.

Tamaki frowned. “What?” he asked, discomfort creasing his eyebrows.

Kyouya took a long drag. “Nothing,” he replied evenly.

Tamaki coughed and rubbed his nose. “How long have you been smoking in here?”

“A while.”

Tamaki paused. Kyouya had the feeling that Tamaki was waiting for him to say something - about them spending the night, about the phone call, about anything. But Kyouya, as usual, didn’t feel like saying a thing. So he just smoked, and stared, until Tamaki looked away.

“I won’t be long,” Tamaki murmured as he shut the bathroom door behind him.

Kyouya leaned back in his chair. He still couldn’t get comfortable, but he wasn’t surprised. He crossed and uncrossed his legs.

The sound of the showerhead in the bathroom burst to life. Kyouya closed his eyes. The muted rush of water hitting tile formed a calming white noise to fill the silent hotel room.

_10 am sharp._

_Be home by 10 am sharp._

The thought was a single point of focus in the strange clarity of his mind. It rapped against the insides of his brain, like a teacher’s pointer or drumming fingertips.

_10 am sharp._

_10 am sharp._

Kyouya smiled wryly. He’d always known he was left-brained, but the proof still amused him. He could hear the change in tone of the water as a body stepped in the shower, the sound of wet feet on ceramic, Tamaki sighing as his body temperature changed. Yet Kyouya couldn’t imagine what water rivulets down that fair skin would look like nor the shade of darkened gold of wet hair. All he could think of was numbers.

_10 am sharp._

_10 am sharp._

There was a small grunt from inside the shower. “Ow,” Tamaki murmured, his voice a quiet echo against the tiles.

_10 am._

Kyouya opened his eyes. The clock on the bedside table flashed the numbers _2:36_ at him in electric red.

Kyouya rubbed the remains of his cigarette in the ashtray. He stood calmly, pushing his robe off his shoulders as he did so. The fabric whispered to pool at his feet; he stepped over it and opened the bathroom door.

Tamaki’s silhouette behind the shower curtain jumped in surprise. When Kyouya pushed aside the curtain, a clearly startled Tamaki tried to cover himself with his hands.

“Kyouya!” he blurted. “I said I wouldn’t be long!”

Kyouya’s glasses fogged up with the steam of the water. He almost lazily pulled the frames down his nose to fold up the glasses with one hand.

“I told you,” he murmured as he reached over Tamaki. He carefully placed his glasses on the soap dish under the showerhead. “Don’t say my name during sex.”

Tamaki blinked water out of his eyes. He wiped dripping bangs off his forehead and averted his eyes, the pink tint of his skin only possibly related to the heat. “Again?” he breathed.

Kyouya pushed up against him until Tamaki’s back hit the wall. Their wet skin slid together, the heat fueling the blood to Kyouya’s stiffening erection. Kyouya closed his eyes and slipped a tongue in Tamaki’s ear.

“Nnn...”

The muscles in Tamaki’s shoulders softened. Kyouya found it harder to breathe with water running into his mouth, but he just wheezed flecks of it onto the lubricated skin he ran his lips over. After a few moments, Tamaki’s hands slid up his back to dig fingers into Kyouya’s neck.

“Just...don’t bite me anymore,” Tamaki murmured. “You really hurt my ear.”

Kyouya trapped one of Tamaki’s thighs between his legs so he could grind his dick against wet skin. Tamaki gasped and closed his eyes, his fingers now plowing through Kyouya’s wet hair.

“H-Haruhi,” Tamaki breathed.

Kyouya only stopped for half a second. Then he pulled back, crammed his tongue in Tamaki’s mouth, and joined in the fantasy of nailing Haruhi Fujioka in that shower.


	4. Suou Manor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is probably the meanest chapter in the whole story, so consider yourself warned. Also, heterosexuality and narrow definitions of virginity! Ho ho ho.
> 
> This chapter has, wait for it...MOOD MUSIC. You'll know it when you see it (and links are provided). This story is pretty much an experiment in mood and setting, so having a soundtrack for one of the chapters seemed oddly fitting.

_Her dark hair splayed against the white pillow, her thin hands plowed through his hair. She breathed heavily, a hint of a moan at the edge of each breath. He hungrily sucked on her white neck as her smooth legs wrapped around his hips. He clutched at one of her tiny breasts._

_“K-Kyouya-senpai,” she breathed. “I--”_

_She cut herself off with a cry as he buried himself in her. He fucked her, slow and hard, and her back arched her naked body closer to his. Her hands fell to his shoulders and her nails dugs into the muscles pulled taut there._

_“Senpai,” Haruhi gasped_ _, her glassy eyes in an unusual state of vulnerability. “Right there...please...!”_

“Right there, please.”

Kyouya blinked. The short note to himself-- _retire the green tea set due to chipping problems--_ lay unfinished below his pencil. He’d actually stopped halfway through the word _green_. He took a moment to refocus his thoughts before taking a breath and clapping shut his black notebook.

“I’m sorry,” he said with a practiced, fake smoothness. He tilted his head down to Haruhi. “What was that?”

Haruhi cocked one eyebrow very slightly. “Someone’s asking for you,” she repeated, sarcasm in her voice. “And she’s right there. Would you go tend to her, please?”

Kyouya’s eyes followed Haruhi’s finger, which pointed to an excited young woman who squirmed on a host club couch. The young woman noticed he was looking at her; she blushed and averted her eyes, her feet tapping quickly on the floor in anticipation.

_Great,_ he thought sourly.Kyouya didn’t mind running the books of the host club, but he found tending to specific guests extremely distasteful. Not only that, but the girl was clearly a first-year--naïve and squealy, if he had to guess.

And he had an erection. Strangely, he’d never had that problem before during host club hours...and it wasn’t like this was the first time he’d had dirty daytime thoughts about Haruhi. He subtly brushed down his uniform coat to make sure it covered his crotch.

“Senpai?”

He looked down at Haruhi again. Her displeasure was melting from her face, replaced with mild concern. “Are you okay?” she asked. “You’ve been a little...out of it since we got back from vacation a few days ago.”

He smiled thinly. “I’m fine,” he assured her. _I just want to fuck you more than usual,_ his brain added. He rested his black ledger on a nearby table. “But I just remembered a financial issue I have to talk to Tamaki about. Would you mind booking that girl for another day? I want to discuss it with him before I forget.”

Haruhi’s eyebrow rose again. He wasn’t sure if she plucked her eyebrows, but he noticed a few out-of-place dark hairs against her pale forehead, and that sign of her imperfection aroused him, in a strange way. Maybe it was because it reflected her lack of superficiality. Or maybe it was because he _wanted_ to see her unkempt, preferably sticky and twisted in rumpled sheets.

Haruhi sighed. “Sure,” she said at last, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She walked over to the girl and said something Kyouya couldn’t hear. She bowed politely.

Kyouya stared at her ass.

_“Senpai...harder! Please!”_

Kyouya’s eyesight swam. He blinked several times to clear it, then removed his glasses so he could wipe them with his sleeve. Doing something with his hands cleared his mind, if only a little.

He couldn’t remember ever being as horny as he had been the past few days. After three rounds in that hotel room, Kyouya had found himself wanting more almost as soon as he arrived home the next day. The merger meeting had been unusually tortuous, as Kyouya had replayed the shower fantasy in his head through the whole thing. It was easier, obviously, without Tamaki’s cock in his hands...and now he had memories to overlay with his Haruhi fantasy--memories of wet skin and hot water, of the echoed sounds of moans, of hitting the lightswitch and getting a handjob in a shower in the dark. He’d even gotten his nipples sucked, and the memory of a hot tongue circling his areola while wet hair slid across his chest was enough to...

A shiver ran down his spine. He erection stiffened further.

Kyouya swallowed before sliding his glasses back onto his face. He’d been masturbating for years to release some steam here and there, but he’d rarely found the need to do it more than once every week or two--when he thought of it and had a few moments to himself, really. But since that night in the hotel, he’d been jerking off daily. Sometimes multiple times a day. He’d rubbed one out right before school that day, in fact.

And he was hard again. When he glanced up again at Haruhi, who now sat and flirted with the disappointed female guest, all he could think of was tearing through Haruhi’s boy clothes and making her a woman on that damned guest couch.

_Easy,_ he warned himself, his hand curling around the ledger as if it were his own libido. _You’re working._

“Kyouya?”

Kyouya jerked around faster than he intended to.

Tamaki smiled. He waved a small calculator in front of Kyouya’s face. “You dropped this,” he said, tucking it into Kyouya’s front jacket pocket. “And did I hear you needed me for something?”

“I...” _Needed you for something,_ Kyouya repeated in his head. His erection strained in his pants.

Kyouya’s heart cooled. “Maybe,” he murmured.

Clearly missing the dark lust in Kyouya’s eyes, Tamaki turned to Haruhi. His normal affection glowed on his face, pure and gentle and a bit naive--the same as it had been for over a year. Kyouya was a little surprised that that naivete hadn’t faded, considering their tryst in the shower. Tamaki had made it very clear whom he’d been fantasizing about.

Kyouya’s eyes fell on Tamaki’s ear. There was cover-up caked on the lobe. A quick scan proved cover-up spread in several other places on Tamaki’s neck and chin.

It annoyed him. Watching Tamaki stare at Haruhi with innocent love in his eyes while make-up barely hid the hickeys on his face...Kyouya found the sight strangely aggravating.

He wanted a cigarette.

“Hey,” Kyouya blurted, his swirl of frustration spurring the word.

“Hm?” Tamaki glanced back at Kyouya.

Kyouya took a breath. “What are you doing after club ends?” he asked quietly.

Tamaki paused. “You mean today?”

“Yes.”

Tamaki paused again. “I had some homework, but nothing much. Why?”

Kyouya stared at him. After a few moments of locking eyes, the smile slowly melted from Tamaki’s face.

“...Oh.”

The unspoken proposition hung in the air between them. Kyouya didn’t like being so direct in a public place, and putting concrete words to his sexual run-ins with Tamaki made the situation seem like that much more of a bad idea. Since Tamaki wasn’t stupid, he was finally getting the hint, even in regard to Kyouya’s distaste for discussing the situation. Tamaki’s blue eyes dropped to the slight bulge in Kyouya’s pants before the boy cleared his throat.

“I guess...I have some free time,” Tamaki murmured.

Kyouya tapped Tamaki’s chin with his pen, smearing a bit of make-up on the plastic edge. “Some of the girls must have asked you about this,” he said quietly enough for only Tamaki to hear.

Tamaki pulled away and touched the covered hickey self-consciously. He averted his eyes, but he didn’t seem as uncomfortable as Kyouya expected. “We wait on _ladies_ here,” Tamaki said shortly. “If any of them noticed, they didn’t say anything.”

“I think you’re lying.”

Tamaki frowned. “Why would I lie about that?” he asked. “Are you trying to make me blush?”

Kyouya stopped abruptly. “No,” he snapped. _Trying to make me blush_ sounded almost flirtatious.

Tamaki sighed. “The twins did make a few comments,” he admitted. “But I had a story lined up, so they left me alone.”

“What story?”

“That I was baking and my dog attacked me when she smelled frosting on my face. Somehow I doubt the twins believed that, though.”

Kyouya snorted. “Forget about them. They just like to be pains in the ass.”

Tamaki shrugged. “I’m not worried, if that’s what you mean.” He paused for a moment, then threw Kyouya a weak smile. “And I don’t want to stop, either.”

The smile was almost...loving. It sent a chill down Kyouya’s spine.

_Don’t do that._

The words died in his throat. But they still echoed in his head, accompanied by a sense of wrongness that clutched his hard heart.

_Don’t._

But what was he supposed to say? Don’t do _what?_

Tamaki had just admitted very clearly that he wanted to fuck around, despite Kyouya’s crude behavior in the bedroom and the problems Kyouya’s hickeys had caused. It meant that Kyouya could still get what he wanted--a hand on his dick that wasn’t his own, a warm body that didn’t complain no matter what he did to it. Hell, it meant that in less than half an hour he could go somewhere deserted with that willing hand and get the erection in his pants properly tended to.

It was the smile that bothered him. And the look in Tamaki’s eyes--the friendly affection that had always resided there had turned a bit deeper, a bit more intimate. Kyouya didn’t know how to pinpoint it, but he knew something new was there. That look. That smile.

_I don’t want to stop._

He hated the way Tamaki had said that. He hated it, hated it, hated it.

In his body, that hate did strange things to his arousal. He wanted to wipe that smile off Tamaki’s face by slamming him into a wall and grinding their crotches together.

Kyouya opened his notebook again so he could lay his eyes anywhere but on Tamaki. He cleared his dry throat as he stared at the unfinished notes on the page.

“My eldest brother has an apartment near here,” he practically croaked. “He’s out of town this week. I have a key.”

Haruhi suddenly called for Tamaki. Tamaki waved at her, then gently touched Kyouya’s shoulder before going over to join her.

Kyouya didn’t look up as Tamaki left. He was too busy trying to subdue an unsettling desire to tear off his shoulder’s skin.

 

**********************************

 

They jerked each other off twice that afternoon. Then they met to do it again three days later. When Kyouya’s brother returned to town and the apartment stopped being safely empty, they simply found other places to go--other hotels, Kyouya’s car when parked in his abandoned garage in the middle of the night. On a particularly desperate day, Kyouya had even pressured Tamaki to do it in the boy’s bathroom at school--although locking the main door and cramming themselves in a stall still didn’t shake the fear that they would somehow get caught, so Tamaki asked Kyouya to promise they wouldn’t do that again.

Unfortunately, each successive meeting wasn’t helping slake Kyouya’s lust. In fact, it was getting worse. On days when they couldn’t meet, Kyouya jerked off. On days he was too busy to jerk off, he usually had wet dreams.His casual, comfortable desire for Haruhi became unusually strong; she was often what he fantasized about during the times when he got off, and thus watching her on host club days put him in an uncomfortable state of desire. Sometimes she just needed to smile at him the right way for him to get a raging hard-on, which he often inflicted on Tamaki the same day.

Kyouya’s frustration seemed to be spurring the whole thing. The gnawing stress ate away his insides like a disease, and every time he got off, the immediate release of his orgasm was still swallowed up by that overall nagging for something he couldn’t place. He wanted something different. He wanted something _more._ The more he avoided it, the more he wanted it, and the less helpful each individual orgasm became.

What was possibly even more frustrating was that Tamaki didn’t seem to be going through the same thing. He was getting off a lot, obviously, but he didn’t seem to _need_ it the way Kyouya did. There were even a few instances where Kyouya had the feeling Tamaki wasn’t in the mood to meet, but the blond would just smile weakly and follow Kyouya and do what they always did with little complaint.

And that look in Tamaki’s eyes grew stronger. That deepening affection; that sexual patience. Those almost “pity” meetings bothered Kyouya, because Tamaki would brush Kyouya off if Kyouya came and Tamaki didn’t. Pleasuring Kyouya didn’t seem to give Tamaki the visceral discomfort it gave Kyouya, and that disturbed Kyouya. A lot.

During one of their overnights, while sleeping in a hotel bed, Kyouya swore he felt Tamaki’s fingers stroking his hair. He’d been too mortified to move, but he’d simultaneously wanted to punch Tamaki in the face and curl into a ball and die.

One Friday in November, everything went to hell.

 

**********************************

 

Kyouya was in a bad mood that day. He’d gotten a few tests back, and he now knew for a fact that his grades were slipping. He calculated that he was no longer at the top of his class, but it wasn’t too late to fix things; he just needed to start marathon study sessions at night. Once school ended, he stood at his desk and uncharacteristically crammed as many notes and textbooks as he could fit in his bag, which tore a few sheets of paper and sent several more fluttering to the floor. He bent to retrieve the lost papers, ignoring the surprised classmates who were taken aback by his ruffled demeanor.

_Yes, children,_ he thought darkly. _Even super-elites have bad days. Now run along and fuck yourselves._

Kyouya straightened to shove the last pages into his bag. He was surprised to find himself face-to-face with Tamaki.

Tamaki blinked. “Uh, hi,” he said, carefully resting his palms on Kyouya’s desk. “You okay?”

Kyouya reigned in his thoughts, which now always turned to sex when he saw Tamaki. “I’m fine,” he said shortly. “Just in a hurry.”

“Really?”

“Yes.” Kyouya sourly slung his bag over his shoulder. “We don’t have a host club meeting today, so I’m going home. I have to study.”

“Oh.” Tamaki paused a moment, as if he were searching for the right thing to say. “Um...can we get a drink before you go home?”

“I’m in a _hurry,_ Tamaki. Ask me again in a few days.”

Kyouya brushed past Tamaki in an attempt to leave the room. He’d almost passed the blond when Tamaki suddenly reached out and grabbed Kyouya’s elbow.

“Wait!”

The sudden desperation in Tamaki’s voice made Kyouya stop. He turned to Tamaki in surprise, but Tamaki abruptly let Kyouya go and turned a deep shade of red.

They stared at each other a moment. Tamaki dropped his eyes to the floor.

Kyouya suddenly remembered where they were; a few students still lingered in the empty classroom. Swiftly deciding that this warranted some privacy, he took a breath and readjusted the strap on his shoulder.

“I drove to school today,” Kyouya said evenly. “I can give you a ride home, at least.”

Tamaki nodded without looking up. Kyouya swiftly made his way to the school parking lot with Tamaki in tow. They walked in silence; they loaded into the car in silence. It wasn’t until after they’d driven off school property and sat waiting at a red light did Kyouya finally open his mouth to say something.

But Tamaki beat him to it. “I really want it today,” he murmured, his voice quiet but firm.

Kyouya stopped. Surprised, he glanced at Tamaki from the corner of his eye. Tamaki reached out and rested his hand on top of Kyouya’s on the gearshift.

Kyouya angrily batted the hand off. “What?” he blurted. “Today?”

Tamaki nervously twisted his hands together. “I know you’re busy, and I’m sorry, just...can we fool around a little?” He swallowed. “Please?”

For a minute, Kyouya was conflicted. He _did_ need to study, and Tamaki usually backed off when Kyouya was adamant about something, but...Tamaki had never initiated one of their trysts. And considering they’d met a dozen times in the past six weeks, that was saying something. Turning Tamaki down on the _one day_ he had a request when he was usually so compliant with Kyouya’s demands would be a truly dickish move, even for Kyouya.

But at the same time, Tamaki was acting differently. He squirmed a bit in his chair and a constant blush hued his cheeks, but he wasn’t acting demure or shy. On the contrary, he was being a bit more forward than usual. And when Kyouya took a moment to process all this, Tamaki reached over again and rested his hand on Kyouya--this time, on Kyouya’s thigh.

Kyouya jerked from the touch so suddenly that the steering wheel twisted in his hands. He abruptly yanked the wheel upright again as the car swerved and Tamaki was thrown in his seat. An angry horn honk from their left dropped in pitch as a car sped by.

His heart pounding, Kyouya shot a sidelong glare at Tamaki. “Don’t do that!” he snapped.

Tamaki wilted a little. Kyouya took a few breaths to calm himself, then opened the small compartment under the dashboard that held a box of cigarettes. He lit up at the next light.

After a long drag, he blew a stream of smoke into the car and pushed his glasses up his nose. “You’re not usually this horny,” he said flatly, trapping the cigarette between his lips so he could drive with both hands.

Tamaki coughed in the smoke. “I know,” he answered, clearing his throat.

“Did you walk into the girl’s locker room or something?”

“No.” Tamaki sighed. After a moment, he added, “I just...had a dream last night. I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Kyouya took another drag. “What kind of dream?”

Tamaki went silent.

_A wet dream,_ Kyouya answered silently. Maybe Tamaki was just embarrassed, but Kyouya was glad the blond didn’t elaborate. Kyouya didn’t care what Tamaki’s subconscious mind wanted to do with Haruhi--it was probably something stupid, anyway, like nailing her in a wedding dress while surrounded by flowers and puppies.

“I really can’t spare more than a hour,” Kyouya warned.

Tamaki sat up. “That’s fine,” he said.

“I didn’t want to get another hotel room this week. But we can’t go anywhere near my place since it’s crowded at this time of--”

“Mine isn’t.” Tamaki rubbed his toes into the carpeting of the floor. “There’s a family event at the main manor that I’m not invited to. Everyone’s there for the day, including most of the servants at my place.”

Kyouya rolled his cigarette from one side of his mouth to the other. “You want to go to your _bedroom?_ ” he clarified.

Tamaki was quiet a moment. “The house is practically empty,” he murmured. “And I have a lock and a stereo.”

Alarm bells started going off in Kyouya’s head. A hotel with two beds was one thing. In the backseat of his car at 2 am in his garage with a dozen other cars between them and the house entrance was another. And the school bathroom after school, even with the main lock and a closed stall and their hands over each other’s mouths...even that had been too close.

But this was Tamaki’s bedroom. The bedroom that he lived in, cleaned by live-in maids, paid for by his father. In broad daylight.

It was way too dangerous. Every self-preservation instinct inside of Kyouya was yelling at him to stop. He had things to do that day anyway, right? He just needed an excuse to turn Tamaki down without being an asshole, and their only privacy being so risky was the perfect way to get out of this.

Of course, his head was making that argument, but the hardening dick in his pants had the veto. That seemed to be the way of things those days.

Kyouya rubbed out his cigarette in the car ashtray and signaled to switch lanes.

**********************************

  
**Third movement:**  http://youtu.be/oqSulR9Fymg

  
**First movement:**  http://youtu.be/O6txOvK-mAk

**********************************

One servant did notice them come in, so Tamaki told her they planned to put music on and study. He turned down her offer of tea. Once in his room, Tamaki locked the door, shakily slid a Beethoven CD into his stereo, and flipped forward a few tracks. He turned the volume up so that the third movement of the Moonlight Sonata flooded the room with the sound of banging piano keys.

Before Kyouya had the chance to do anything, Tamaki threw his arms around Kyouya’s neck and kissed him passionately. Kyouya was caught off-guard by the forwardness and stumbled backward; his back hit a wall close to the bed, and Tamaki pressed up against him hard enough for Kyouya to feel his erection. Tamaki’s tongue filled Kyouya’s mouth as his fingers plowed through Kyouya’s hair.

“Mmm...”

Kyouya grunted and tried to push Tamaki’s face back, since the sudden kiss was crushing Kyouya’s glasses into his sinuses. Tamaki pulled back just enough to breathe and push Kyouya’s glasses up his forehead before diving his tongue in again. His index finger hooked into Kyouya’s school tie and pulled it loose.

Kyouya’s heart was thundering in his chest, and something uncomfortable seized inside his ribcage--something unnerving, something that made him feel threatened and angry and miserable. Tamaki being the aggressor possibly had something to do with it. He managed to flip their positions so Tamaki was against the wall, but it didn’t change much; Tamaki just moaned and hooked a leg around Kyouya’s hip, latching his lips onto Kyouya’s Adam’s apple.

“Kyouya,” he breathed as he ran his tongue over Kyouya’s throat.

_What the fuck?!_

Something was very wrong. Tamaki was aggressive, but his leg was wrapped around Kyouya’s waist, his mouth on the decidedly male portion of Kyouya’s throat...and his name, dammit, his _name_. Kyouya panted and tried to push Tamaki off.

“Let... _fuck!_ Let go if you’re...”

Tamaki’s hand slid up under Kyouya’s shirt. “Kyouya,” he whispered. “Touch me.”

“Shut _up,_ Tamaki!” Kyouya finally managed to push Tamaki’s head back with both hands, so Tamaki just breathed, licked his glistening lips, and stared.

He stared at Kyouya with that look in his eyes. His lids were heavy, his skin was flushed, and he stared at Kyouya with an affection far, far outside of Kyouya’s comfort zone.

Although he was loathe to admit it, in that moment Kyouya was flooded with sheer terror.

Tamaki leaned in again. Kyouya slapped a hand to Tamaki’s collarbone and pushed the blond hard against the wall. He panted for a moment, his mind a tangle of panic and disgust and something else he couldn’t name, and then his body did what it always did with Tamaki--it translated all of his feelings into something angry.

Kyouya yanked his tie free from his uniform collar. To the sound of thundering piano music increasing in intensity around them, Kyouya roughly tied the necktie around Tamaki’s eyes. When Tamaki opened his mouth, Kyouya pushed two fingers into it and held down Tamaki’s tongue.

“It’s too...bright in here,” Kyouya murmured. “It’s too early, and your curtains are thin.”

_And I don’t want you looking at me like that._

Kyouya’s fingers were shaking, and he couldn’t stop them. He internally cursed himself. Although Tamaki blissfully didn’t try to speak, he wrapped his tongue around Kyouya’s trembling, invading fingers and started to suck.

Kyouya practically threw Tamaki onto his neatly made bed. They both struggled out of their clothes, throwing Ouran-issued jackets and buttoned shirts to the far corners of the bedroom floor. Tamaki struggled with his fly because of the blindfold; Kyouya tore through it so hard a button popped off. After Kyouya freed his own dick, he grabbed Tamaki’s discarded necktie from elsewhere on the bed and tied it around his own eyes in attempt to block out as much of what was happening as he could. He straddled Tamaki, ground his erection into the one below him, and jammed his tongue into Tamaki’s moaning mouth.

They groped and sucked and humped each other blindly, their frenzied movements jostling the bed enough to send a throw pillow careening into Kyouya’s hip before spilling off the side. The loud music from the stereo’s expensive speakers drowned out everything but the muffled vibrations of moans under Kyouya, and the necktie blocked out the sight of Tamaki’s supine, writhing body, his chest bare and his pulsing dick clasped tightly in Kyouya’s hand. Thinking that, of course, make Kyouya visualize it, which further tightened the vice around his heart and his free fingers around the bed comforter.

“Kyouya!”

Kyouya barely heard his name, but it still infuriated him. He squeezed Tamaki’s erection; Tamaki cried out, his own fingers momentarily going slack on Kyouya’s cock. When Kyouya lessened his grip, he could feel pre-cum drip over his fingers as Tamaki’s dick quivered. Tamaki abandoned Kyouya’s erection entirely to throw his arms around Kyouya’s neck and wrap his legs around Kyouya’s waist, pushing Kyouya’s handjob against Kyouya’s pelvis and nudging Kyouya’s pants further down his bony hips.

_“Je t’aime,”_ Tamaki whined, his lips pushed so far into Kyouya’s ear that Kyouya couldn’t ignore him. _“Je t’aime, mon ami!”_

Tamaki’s voice cracked on a high note as he came, his gasps flooding Kyouya’s ear as his semen flooded Kyouya’s hand. He arched against Kyouya, the sweaty skin of his chest and abdomen slapping up against Kyouya’s, his sock-covered feet crossed and pushing into the small of Kyouya’s back. His fingers ran up the back of Kyouya’s neck to bury in his hair, sending a shiver down Kyouya’s spine.

The shiver turned to ice in Kyouya’s veins when Tamaki came down from his orgasm--only to hug Kyouya’s head closer and bury his face in Kyouya’s hair.

“K-Kyouya,” Tamaki breathed.

_Motherfucking..._

Kyouya couldn’t take it anymore. He detangled himself from Tamaki’s arms and legs, pulling the necktie from his own eyes as he did so. He crawled up Tamaki’s body, grabbed a handful of golden hair, and thrust his penis into Tamaki’s mouth.

Tamaki choked.

Digging his knees into the bed by Tamaki’s head, Kyouya rocked his pelvis forward. The wet warmth of Tamaki’s mouth, filled with movement as Tamaki’s tongue desperately tried to block Kyouya’s cock from the back of his throat, was like nothing Kyouya had ever felt before. He lost all sense of reason. Lust in his body and hate and fear in his heart, he gritted his teeth and fucked Tamaki in the mouth for telling him he loved him.

“Mmgh!” One of Tamaki’s shaking hands clutched at Kyouya’s knee, but he didn’t bite down. Kyouya thrust a few more times, and in a matter of seconds he exploded in Tamaki’s mouth, his back arching perpendicular to his legs so tightly and suddenly that his muscles screamed with the effort. Sucking breath back into his lungs as he blinked stars from his eyes, Kyouya’s body folded under him. He fell to the side, one leg still sprawled over Tamaki’s heaving chest.

Tamaki abruptly twisted away to spit Kyouya’s semen out on the sheets. His blindfold had been knocked askew when Kyouya came; he yanked it down before scrambling from Kyouya and practically falling off the far side of the bed. When he managed to get to his feet and whip to Kyouya, his eyes were bloodshot and tears gathered at their corners.

“Kyouya!” Tamaki gasped, his voice trembling. “How...how could you do that?!”

All the energy had drained from Kyouya’s body. He lay there, his face half-buried in the comforter, breathing heavily as his eyes locked with Tamaki’s. Those blue orbs were so filled with shock and heartbreak that for a moment Kyouya thought he was staring at a stranger.

The music ended abruptly, flooding the room with silence. The CD player made a little click as it restarted its playlist, and then the first movement of Moonlight Sonata began its quiet melody.

Kyouya closed his eyes.

He wouldn’t open them. Not as he heard Tamaki suck in breaths, not as the quiet sound of the piano lay a melancholy blanket over the room. He couldn’t think, he had nothing to say, and all he wanted to do was lay there and stay blind.

After a moment, he heard the thumping of footsteps thud his way. He was suddenly and forcefully rolled onto his back.

“Kyouya!” Tamaki shouted, grabbing Kyouya’s chin. “Kyouya, look at me!”

Kyouya half-heartedly tried to brush Tamaki off, but Tamaki just squeezed his fingers into Kyouya’s jaw. “ _Kyouya!_ ” he cried as a few hot tears dripped onto Kyouya’s chin from above. “Say something!”

Kyouya finally raised his eyelids. He stared into those glassy blue eyes; his cold, apathetic gaze was reflected back in them. Something faint fluttered deep inside his heart, but it faded just as quickly.

He went numb.

“I told you,” Kyouya said at last, his voice even. “I don’t want you talking like that during sex.”

Tamaki’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. He gritted his teeth and released Kyouya, using the back of his hand to instead wipe at his eyes.

“I’ve told you I care about you before!” he shouted. “Why is it different now?! Are you saying you want me to care _less_ when we’re touching each other?!”

Strength slowly started bubbling up inside Kyouya. That frustration, that anger, was settling back in its rightful place inside his body. He pushed his dick back into his pants and stood, his glare cold.

“That’s _exactly_ what I’m saying,” he snapped. “I’m not thinking about you. I’m thinking about girls. _You_ were thinking about girls. I thought you’d finally grasped that.”

“What does it matter what I’m thinking about?! I’m still here with you!”

“You’re not _supposed_ to be here with me,” Kyouya growled. “We’re just letting off steam, Tamaki. This isn’t real.”

Tamaki clenched his fists, his half-naked body trembling in the faint afternoon light. He looked...weak. Not feminine, and not sexualized, but frail and weak and helpless. Kyouya had never thought of Tamaki like that, but the way Tamaki stood there, with a blindfold hanging around his neck and his lips wet with Kyouya’s cum, was like something out a bad dream. He looked like a boy who’d been hurt and robbed of something he couldn’t get back.

Like a victim.

_As a victim._

The thought suddenly rang through Kyouya’s head, a gong that shattered the silence in his mind.

A victim.

He was a victim.

_You hurt him._

_You made him this._

Kyouya’s vision blurred. He suddenly felt like he was going to be sick.

“That...dream,” he croaked, disgust welling up his throat. “It wasn’t about Haruhi, was it?”

Tamaki said nothing. He just swallowed and untied the tie around his neck.

Kyouya’s vision blurred further. Tamaki was just an outline now, a peach shape against the white curtains that bled light from behind him. The piano notes from the stereo filled Kyouya’s ears, blocking out the sound of his thudding heart.

“Did you...like it?” he hissed without thinking. “Do you like the thought of me fucking you, fag?”

Tamaki’s fist crushed into Kyouya’s jaw with such a force that Kyouya stumbled backward. He knocked into the stereo, disconnecting one of the wires and suddenly dropping the room into a thick, tangible sea of silence.

That silence was more deafening than the music had been. Kyouya swallowed. He unconsciously touched the corner of his mouth and adjusted his glasses; when he pulled back his fingers, he saw blood.

Tears rolled down Tamaki’s face. He ground his teeth, his white-knuckled fists shaking by his sides. A tiny, high-pitched whine escaped his throat--the sobbing he held back, pushed down his esophagus by anger and pain.

“Kyouya,” he strangled out, his voice cracking. “What’s happened to you?”

Kyouya didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer. His chin throbbed, but distantly--like someone else had been hit and was only describing the pain.

Tamaki suddenly hiccuped, the anger in his face melting into despair.

“This isn’t you,” he sobbed, covering his mouth with his fingers. “Kyouya, I’m not your sex toy--I’m your friend!”

_Get out._

The order in Kyouya’s mind was urgent. He stiffly threw on his shirt without buttoning it, grabbed his jacket, and walked out the door.

_Get out._

He marched down the stairs, his reflexes slowed and distant as if he were drunk. A servant called to him, then cut herself off in surprise. He didn’t care what he looked like, leaving Tamaki’s room half-dressed.

He didn’t care about anything.

He just had to get out.

_Go. Now._

It was the only thought he could process, so he followed it unconditionally.

He heard the stereo start blaring again behind him, from the top of the stairs. The slow piano piece didn’t cover the sound of something shattering against the bedroom wall.

 

**********************************

 

Kyouya smoked an entire pack of cigarettes in his car that evening. He drove to a parking lot known as a popular make-out site among commoners, turned off the engine, and smoked for hours. Cars pulled up in other spots around him; some couples left while holding hands, others stayed in and steamed up their windows. Kyouya just smoked. He smoked until the inside of his car was thick with poison and his eyes watered and his throat burned.

His cell phone went off a few times, but he didn’t answer it. His bag stuffed with study materials lay forgotten on the floor.

When he was out of cigarettes, he rested his hands on the steering wheel and stared at them. After a few minutes of silence, he turned the key in the ignition.

He drove to an area of town he’d heard about from less reputable acquaintances. He parked in an inconspicuous parking lot and walked five blocks. He stopped in a convenience store on the way to buy more cigarettes.

The cashier was probably 16; a skinny boy with glasses and a haircut from an unskilled barber. As he rang out Kyouya, his eyes widened.

“Nii-san,” he murmured. “Are you okay?”

Kyouya furrowed his brow. “What?” he murmured.

The boy gestured to Kyouya’s chin. Kyouya touched it; pain immediately sparked through his jaw.

“That’s gonna bruise pretty bad,” the boy told him. “I fell off my bike once and got one of those. You should probably get that looked at.”

Kyouya paused. The boy opened his mouth to say something, then seemed to change his mind. He quietly put a box of matches on top of the cigarettes.

Kyouya took a breath. “Wait,” he said, and left the counter. He gathered bad cover-up, cheap cologne, and several other things from the convenience store aisles. He dumped the lot of it on the counter and threw down his credit card.

The boy stared at the platinum card in surprise, then stared at Kyouya. Kyouya’s hard gaze seemed to disturb the boy; the cashier cleared his throat and rang up the items.

Kyouya cleaned up in a public restroom. He threw out everything he didn’t immediately need. He then went down the street to a bar that didn’t card and sat on an isolated stool. He ordered hard liquor, downed it, and then nursed a second drink while he smoked.

It didn’t take long. He was mostly surrounded by college students and young punks, and he could feel them staring at his school pants and dress shirt and expensive shoes. A young woman sat down beside him, the scent of her make-up and perfume breaking through the smell of alcohol and tobacco.

“Hey,” she said, her voice a calm velvet. “What’s a cute thing like you doing here alone?”

Kyouya turned to her. She was probably in her early twenties. Her hair was dyed a bright red--but it was trendy rather than tacky. Her jewelry was bright-colored and intentionally cheap. She wore a tank top and a black skirt with dark, bizarre pantyhose under it.

She didn’t look or dress like anyone he knew. Not like his classmates, not like Haruhi, and not like Tamaki.

She smiled at him. She suddenly noticed his chin; she laughed in surprise.

“What happened?” she asked as she gently touched his covered bruise. “Get in a fight? Wow; I hope you won.”

Her fingers were warm--almost too warm on his skin. When she dropped them from his face, she dipped them into the box of cigarettes in his front shirt pocket.

“Do you mind?” she asked, slowly pulling one out. She slid it between lips that shone with lip gloss.

Kyouya stared at her.

_Get out._

_Get out._

He rubbed out his cigarette on the ashtray in front of him.

“No,” he said evenly, pulling his lighter out of his back pocket. He flicked the flame into life, then touched it to the end of her cigarette.

Kyouya lost his virginity that night.


	5. Bathtub

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was hard. (Pun not intended this time.) Kyouya, in this fic, is completely batshit, and unraveling that in its own chapter proved extremely difficult. Finished the day before Ramadan, because I don't write smut during Ramadan. WHAT A CLASS ACT.
> 
> In case anyone's confused about the assumptions in this story, Japanese schools tend to have half-days (in the morning) on Saturdays and you need to be 18 to get a driver's license. And skinship is oftentimes (always?) non-sexual skin-skin touching and is actually a word in Japanese, although it's based off English words (SUKIN SHIPPU), and as a North American English-speaker I find that insane. Also, I've already broken a lot of canon with this story, but I also tried to establish that this takes place when Kyouya and Tamaki are seniors, hence turning 18 and no Hunni or Mori. Just in case people were holding out for Hunni or Mori. Sorry.

_Kyouya was dreaming._

_He was seven years old, standing on-stage in a stiff school uniform under uncomfortably warm lights. He was reciting Momoyama-era poetry with clear, beautiful precision. The audience clapped, including his nanny. His father sat beside her, his arms crossed and his face unreadable. His nanny tried to take Kyouya out for ice cream after the performance. He didn’t want to because his father had gone home to work, and Kyouya felt, for some reason, that he would be punished if he didn’t do the same._

_Then he was ten, stepping out of a chauffeured car on the wrong side of the street. The driver yelled at him to stop, but Kyouya was already out; another car screamed by him, missing his toes by a hair and honking so loudly he thought his ears would burst. He jumped back into the car and curled into a ball, terrified. The driver reached over the seat and asked something about being all right. Kyouya hugged his knees to his chest, his eyes wide and his heart thundering, and unconsciously tried to keep out of the way of the driver’s sympathetic palm. He didn’t want to be touched. He had almost died and he didn’t want to be touched. The driver told him to wake up, but Kyouya couldn’t._

_He was fifteen, and Tamaki Suou was squealing by his side inside castle ruins in Kyoto. He kept grabbing Kyouya’s arm and pulling Kyouya along even when Kyouya tried to pull away. It was an audio tour, so unhygienic headphones were stuffed over his ears and blocked out all but Tamaki’s loudest shrieks. Tamaki kept touching him, touching him, and Kyouya hated it. When they stopped for food, Tamaki ate a takoyaki off of Kyouya’s skewer without asking, leaving prints of his lips in the sauce on the wooden stick. Kyouya threw the stick away and wouldn’t answer when Tamaki asked why. Tamaki told Kyouya to wake up, even as he ran his hands over Kyouya’s face and slipped his fingers into Kyouya’s mouth and dropped his eyelids like a sex kitten._

_Then Kyouya was in the host club, his ears ringing from the demands of the guests, the grip on his pencil tight enough that he broke the lead against a page in his ledger. He wanted to hurt someone. A red film came over his eyes and he knew he had to get out. He stepped into a walk-in closet, breathing deeply, trying to subdue his desire to close his fingers around pale throats. Haruhi came up behind him to ask if he was all right. He turned to her, saw that her eyes were sympathetic, that her tie was loose enough for him to see a triangle of skin leading down to her covered breasts. His anger twisted with desire. She was only half in the closet, and he was afraid that she’d take a step closer, making it possible for him to reach over her to the sliding door and lock them both inside._

_Kyouya was fourteen again, touching himself under his covers with his eyes closed. The maid knocked on his door and told him to wake up. He pretended to be asleep so he could keep touching himself. She told him to wake up, wake up._

_He was seventeen, trying a cigarette for the first time on a street corner where no one would know him._

_He was eleven, wondering if his father would visit him in the hospital if he drove his bicycle into a wall._

_He was drowning, drowning in a pool in his family’s resort because he hadn’t admitted his couldn’t swim. Somebody reached under the water and grabbed him just above the elbow, squeezing hard, then relaxing, then squeezing hard again without pulling him out. He opened his mouth and choked on something hard. For a moment he thought it was somebody’s penis._

Kyouya’s eyes shot open, dropping him into reality like a ton of bricks.

He sucked air into his lungs, grabbing at the bedsheets with one hand and at a plastic thermometer crammed into his mouth with another. The maid who held the thermometer cried out and released it; Kyouya yanked the thing out of his mouth and threw it in a panic, sending it sailing into a wall. Kyouya heaved, his heart thundering in his chest.

It was the way the thermometer had been rammed near the back of his throat. He covered his mouth with a hand, suddenly nauseous.

A familiar sigh came from a blurred shape that sat next to his bed. Kyouya blearily reached around his bedside table until he found his glasses.

“Are you finally awake?” his eldest brother asked evenly, unstrapping the blood pressure cuff from around Kyouya’s arm. “The servants have been trying to wake you for hours.”

Kyouya could only blink his eyes. He was in his own room, he saw, and with that realization came a blurred flood of memories from the night before. Most of those memories involved thrusting into a hot, wet body in a room that wasn’t his own. He couldn’t remember how he’d gotten home or what day it was.

He looked up. His brother’s gaze was authoritarian, like his father’s, but it didn’t have the same accusatory edge. It was colder. More distanced.

Kyouya rubbed his eyes as an excuse to look away. His brother dismissed the maids; they bowed before leaving.

“You missed school this morning, Kyouya.” His brother stood, the wood of his chair creaking as he did so. “Maybe it’s time we put you on medication for your hypotension.”

“I’m fine,” Kyouya mumbled instinctively.

“You’ve lost weight, and you don’t have much to spare. And you were probably dehydrated last night...were you drinking?”

_Clearly not,_ Kyouya thought sourly.

“I mean alcohol,” his brother clarified as if he could read Kyouya’s mind.

Kyouya closed his eyes. He couldn’t answer the question because he couldn’t remember.

The entire night was lost to him. The girl, the bar, the alcohol, the love hotel. It was a tangle of blurred images in his mind, and he wasn’t sure how much of it had happened and how much had been a dream. He knew he’d had intercourse with her, since the tacky condom had smelled like cherry and that memory, for some reason, stood out above all others. But he didn’t remember much about what it was like, or if she’d asked him for payment at the end.

But that was the night. Only the night. The afternoon had left such a deep, burning impression that every moment in Suou manner was now permanently imprinted onto Kyouya’s brain.

_What does it matter what I’m thinking about?! I’m still here with you!_

_I’m still here with you!_

**_I’m still here with you!_ **

He could still feel Tamaki’s shaking hand on his knee. He could still hear Tamaki’s cries muffled by his dick.

Kyouya, for a brief instant, thought about killing himself.

His brother’s sigh broke the quiet of the room. Kyouya was brought back to the moment at hand, and some survival instinct buried his guilt as deeply as it could.

The line of Kyouya’s mouth hardened.

_Get out._

He knew that.

_Get out._

He had.

_You ended it._

“Kyouya.”

Kyouya could hear his heartbeat in his ears, but it had slowed to a normal pace. The nausea in his stomach settled, the twitch in his fingers calmed. The dark, cold blanket of his displacement stifled his panic reaction.

It was gone. It was done. It was over.

He had assaulted his best friend, but now it was over.

_“Kyouya,”_ his brother said, a bit more forcefully this time.

Kyouya swallowed. “What?” he murmured, his voice low.

His brother irritably unclipped the stethoscope earpiece from around his neck. “I don’t necessarily mean this as a warning,” he said thinly, “but Father suspects you’re seeing someone. He asked me to check your credit card history and report what I found, so I did.” He pushed up his glasses, which had slid down his nose. “If he asks me to do it again, I will.”

Kyouya rubbed his thudding temples. “Whatever,” he murmured, the quiet cruelty in him taking over.

“Kyouya.”

Kyouya glanced up.

His brother stared at him a minute, some strange, muted emotion behind his dark eyes. “I’m not sure Father ever gave you the relationship talk,” he said at last. “In case he was expecting me to do it, I’ll give you the short version: use your head. Use protection and don’t sleep with a girl who could hurt the family’s reputation. Your marriage is one thing, but for now, as long as you don’t advertise who you’re with, those are the only rules you need to follow.”

Kyouya noticed, wryly, that that moment of silence from a minute before had been discomfort. _You were hoping I got the sex talk from someone else,_ he thought. _Anybody but you, huh?_

It was typical of him. Dismissive, uninterested, and uncaring. Kyouya had only seen his brother treat a few patients, but he knew that his brother’s bedside manner wasn’t much different. He wasn’t suited to being a doctor--it contrasted starkly with his nature.

But it didn’t matter, since an Ootori son’s existence was defined by the job laid out for him.

Kyouya was too exhausted and hateful to feel sympathy. Maybe, long ago, he’d felt just as bad for his siblings as he’d felt for himself...but now he just couldn’t be bothered to care about any of them.

“Understood,” Kyouya said, his voice as cool as his heart.

He wasn’t sure if his brother took offense at his tone, but it didn’t seem to matter. His brother headed for the door, but paused before opening it.

“It’s not difficult, Kyouya,” he said shortly. “Be smart about it and you can sleep with whomever you want.”

Kyouya didn’t look up, but he heard the doorknob rattle, the door creak open, the footsteps continue. The door made a soft _chunk_ as it closed Kyouya into silence.

Kyouya sighed and let his head sag forward. He rested a hand on his neck, his fingers sliding through the shortly cropped ends of his hair. He closed his eyes.

_It’s not true,_ he thought with disdain, a dark shade of that nagging frustration clawing at the edges of his mind. His brow creased slightly against his will. He could feel his blood start to pump normally at last, but it only served to fuel the heavy frustration that had dragged him down in the first place.

It wasn’t true. The members of his family were a lot of things, but they certainly weren’t liars. Yet the policy wasn’t true.

_Be smart about it and you can sleep with whomever you want._

Kyouya’s fingers clenched, digging nails into his own neck.

_Except a boy,_ he thought dryly. _You would kill me if it was a boy._

**********************************

 

Kyouya had expected Monday to be difficult. He didn’t expect Tamaki to forgive him for what he’d done on Friday. He didn’t ask, nor particularly want, to be forgiven. What was done was done and Kyouya had no excuses.

But to his surprise, it wasn’t difficult at all. It was just...quiet.

Halfway through the day, he nearly bumped into Tamaki in the hall. The two of them met eyes. Tamaki stared at Kyouya a minute, his lips a tight line, before dropping his gaze to the floor. He brushed past Kyouya and continued to his class.

And that was it.

Kyouya was surprised despite himself.

_What the hell?_ he thought, his eyes following Tamaki as the blond disappeared into a classroom. He stared, and waited, but nothing changed.

Kyouya kept expecting something else to happen--for Tamaki to scream at him, to burst into tears, to apologize for something tangentially related to Friday’s assault. But Tamaki did nothing. Kyouya stared at that classroom door until after the bell rang. It wasn’t until a teacher nudged him that he even realized he was standing in a stranded hall between classes.

_You ended it._

The three words, paraded around defensively by his mind, suddenly seemed sharper. Harsher.

Real.

_It’s over._

For a brief moment, Kyouya wasn’t sure what to feel.

The teacher gently admonished him to get to class. Clearing his throat, Kyouya responded with a formal bow and a brisk walk to his next class.

_This was what you wanted,_ he thought. _You’ve wanted to end it since the beginning._

Kyouya sat through his lectures that day like the top student he was. When he went home that night, he studied for hours. After his sister wished him good night, he changed his clothes, took his car keys, and left the house.

It was cool outside; he shivered in his thin jacket. He sat in his car and let it run for a few minutes. As the heater slowly warmed the interior of the car, Kyouya watched the windshield fog in a slow, thick bloom.

He remembered how hot Tamaki’s hands had been up his shirt. He remembered the creaking of the passenger’s seat below them.

_Faggot._

Kyouya felt a low shudder run through his body. He closed his eyes.

It was true that he’d wanted to end it since the beginning. That night in the club had been a mistake. Kyouya had known, really, that Tamaki couldn’t handle empty sex, and that Kyouya would eventually hurt him if they continued.

But lust had driven them--lust and stupidity. Tamaki had succumbed like so many desperate teenagers. All of Kyouya’s efforts to keep distance between them had failed, and they were left with a relationship ruined by different expectations.

He’d seen it coming. He’d tried to prepare for it.

And now it was over. Ended and done.

_Get out._

Kyouya opened his eyes. The windshield before him was a white haze, blurring the world and its realities outside. The vent was warm, lulling his body into a sense of comfort and power.

Something cold crawled over his heart. Kyouya closed his hand over the leather knob of the gearshift.

_Fine._

He wasn’t the same man he’d been that summer. And he didn’t want to fight it anymore. If this was who he was, then this was who he was.

He shifted the car into “drive.”

 

**********************************

 

Two weeks passed.

Kyouya updated the host club purchase log, his pencil scratching fast against a page in his notebook. His initial math suggested they were over budget, but he didn’t want to react until he confirmed that with a calculator.

A guest chirped something about designating Haruhi. Kyouya pointed with his pencil, not bothering to look up.

“You can ask her directly if she has time. She should be done with her current guest.”

The girl didn’t leave. Kyouya, after finishing his thought in the notebook, looked up in annoyance. What more did she want from him?

The girl stared at him with wide eyes. “K-Kyouya-sama?” she squeaked.

“Yes?”

The girl swallowed. “You said...‘she.’”

Kyouya’s jaw clenched.

_Brilliant, Kyouya._

“Did I?” he asked through gritted teeth. “Perhaps we’re dressing him like a woman too often, then. Freudian slip.”

The girl smiled uncomfortably, but she seemed to believe him. She murmured a small thanks and quickly left his side. He flipped his page as he heard her school shoes tap on marble.

He felt like an idiot. He swallowed and tried to focus on his task to bury the sense of humiliation welling up inside him.

“A mistake like that isn’t like you,” teased a smooth voice from behind.

Kyouya snarled under his breath.

“And this is the second time this week,” added a second voice. “If you’re not careful, you’re gonna ruin the host club’s fun with Haruhi.”

Kyouya ignored them. The upcoming purchase list was longer than it was supposed to be halfway through the month, so he started ticking off purchases they could postpone until next budget period.

There was a double sigh. “You’re not much fun these days,” Hikaru and Kaoru complained in unison.

“I’m not here to amuse you,” Kyouya replied darkly.

Hikaru sniffed. “But senpai,” he whined. “We neeeed you.”

“I sincerely doubt that.”

“It’s true, it’s true. We need your advice.”

Kyouya irritably snapped his ledger shut. “What?” he muttered.

Hikaru’s frown melted away, leaving the tips of his lips to curl up in a half-smile. “You’re edgy,” he purred. “Is something wrong?”

“Stress in your life?” Kaoru added, his arms draping around his brother.

Kyouya wished, not for the first time, that he could cram the twins into a sack and drown them.

“I don’t have time to play your games,” Kyouya snapped. “If you don’t need me for something, get your asses to work.”

“But we _do_ need you,” Hikaru insisted, sending a glance at his twin. “Right, Kaoru?”

“Right!”

Hazel eyes rolled lazily over to Kyouya. “We want to solve a mystery,” he drawled. “The case of the Ouran slut.”

Kyouya froze. Slow, quiet rage began bubbling inside him, starting at his stomach and making its way up.

“You _see,_ ” Kaoru explained, talking a walk around his brother, “a college friend of ours works in Kabukicho, handing out flyers for clubs. She told us there’s a boy about her age who’s been walking around there recently. She only noticed him because he was so good-looking.” Kaoru smiled slyly. “She’s got the fetish,” he added, tapping where eyeglasses would rest on his face.

“He never looked at her and left with a different girl every night, so she figured it was a lost cause. But one day, her shift ended right when he drove up.” Hikaru crossed his arms. “She went to talk to him directly, but he was making a beeline for some bar. She happened to look inside his car and noticed a high school book bag on the back seat. And she mentioned it to _us_ because there was a school emblem on that book bag.” Hikaru raised an eyebrow. “Can you guess what emblem it was?”

Kyouya’s fingers curled into a fist. His ledger was held so tightly in his other hand that his fingertips had turned white.

_Shut the fuck up,_ he silently warned.

Hikaru ignored Kyouya’s seething glare. “We told her that, y’know, anyone who could drive would have to be eighteen, so this boy was probably a high school senior. With a black car. And about two weeks ago, he had a fading bruise on his chin...”

Kaoru shrugged and smiled. “We told her we couldn’t help her. Do you know how many seniors here have glasses and black cars?”

Kyouya tried to control his breathing in an attempt to control his temper. The twins threw him their mocking smiles, their eyes identical sets of instigating mischief. They were always trying to push him. They always tried to push _everyone_ , of course, but he’d been their particular target for weeks now. They’d sensed something was off and amused themselves by exploiting that.

They were dangerously close to crossing the line. And Kyouya was dangerously close to punishing them for it.

“Kyouya-senpai?”

Haruhi’s voice suddenly cut through the tension. Swallowing his anger, Kyouya turned.

Haruhi was undoing her tie, although she paused when he looked to her. She frowned.

“Uh...are you okay, senpai?”

The twins snickered from behind him. Ignoring them as best he could, Kyouya cleared his throat.

“Just preoccupied. What is it?”

Haruhi didn’t seem to buy his answer. After a moment, she sighed and slid the tie off her neck.

“I actually have to get home early today. I have a few girls in the queue--would you mind booking them for next club day?”

“You’re leaving?”

“Yeah, my dad asked if I could help him with...” She trailed off, that frown overtaking her face again.

Her gaze was gentle, but penetrating. Kyouya didn’t feel entirely comfortable with it. He looked down at his ledger and thought about her naked.

“Senpai?”

“Fine,” he said dismissively, ticking in his notebook. “I’ll book them for next time. Is that all?”

She paused again. After a minute, she gripped the edge of his sleeve.

“Can we talk in private?”

_No._

Kyouya didn’t say it out loud, but every nerve in his body screamed it.

He didn’t want to be alone with her. He was already thinking about her naked. And he could still remember what it felt like to have a friend struggling under him.

The pencil in his hand shook.

When he didn’t respond, Haruhi leaned past him and gestured to the twins.

“Give us some space, please.”

Hikaru clicked his tongue. “But Kyouya-senpai was helping us,” he complained.

“Yeah--we thought he could help us with a mystery.”

Haruhi, much better at deflecting the twins, told them to see to the guests so she could leave on time. They retorted, but playfully, and did as she asked.

Once the twins were far enough away, Haruhi released Kyouya’s sleeve and looked up into his eyes.

“I know something happened between you and Tamaki.”

Kyouya couldn’t keep up with her gaze. He looked away, hating himself for needing to.

“Nothing happened,” he muttered.

Haruhi sighed. “I’m not an idiot, senpai. Everyone can see you two aren’t talking to each other.”

“And?” Indignation began to swell inside Kyouya, overtaking a bit of his insecurity. He scowled down at her. “Sometimes we don’t talk. End of story.”

Haruhi said nothing. She glanced at something behind him; Kyouya turned just in time to see Tamaki staring at them while he kissed a guest’s hand.

Kyouya froze. Tamaki, upon being noticed, turned his gaze back to his guest and flashed her a weak smile.

Kyouya gritted his teeth. Something unpleasant swirled in his stomach.

_Has he been watching me?_

Maybe it was because Kyouya was with Haruhi. Kyouya knew that Tamaki would have mixed feelings about that. Maybe Tamaki thought Kyouya was dangerous now.

_Do you think I’m going to hurt her?_

“Kyouya-senpai?”

Kyouya’s heart thudded in his ears. He barely noticed Haruhi grip one of his wrists; Kyouya was too busy staring at Tamaki.

Tamaki didn’t forgive him.

Tamaki didn’t trust him.

Of course he didn’t.

As Kyouya watched Tamaki whisper something into his guest’s ear, a hot, paralyzing anger flooded his veins and fogged his vision.

_If this is who I am, then this is who I am._

Kyouya’s mouth hardened. He pulled himself free of Haruhi’s grip and instead glared down at her with cold eyes.

“Let’s talk alone,” he said lowly.

Haruhi stopped. Her eyebrows furrowed.

“Um...sure,” she said after a moment. “If you’re willing to talk, I’m willing to list--”

Kyouya grabbed her by the upper arm and practically dragged her into the hallway. She blurted a protest as her feet scrambled for a hold on the floor, but he ignored her. He was barely even aware of one of the twins calling out to them before the door to Music Room #3 swung shut behind them.

The hallway was deserted, since school had ended a time earlier. Kyouya pushed Haruhi up against the wall and pressed close enough to breathe down into her face.

“Do you want him?” he hissed. “Is that why you care?”

Alarm lit up Haruhi’s eyes. She slammed both of her palms against Kyouya’s chest. “What’s wrong with you?!” she exclaimed. “Senpai, get off me!”

He could feel the pull of her nails hands through his jacket. They were so close that her body heat radiated onto him. It wouldn’t take much to be closer. Just one step and those small breasts would be crushed against his torso.

His fingers trembling, he gripped her chin and jerked her face up. “Nothing’s wrong with me,” he spat. “Did any of you stop to think that this is who I _really_ am?”

_This isn’t you._

The sound of Tamaki’s shaking voice rang in Kyouya’s ears. The sound of piano music, of Tamaki gagging on his cock, of something shattering as he left the room. The sound of Tamaki moaning that he loved him.

Kyouya’s fingers plowed into Haruhi’s jaw as she cried out.

He’d fucked a different girl in a different hotel almost every night since that day. Young, old, fat, thin. One had asked to call him a different name, one had asked to be tied to the bed. Several had been on top. One couldn’t cum unless he fucked her in the room’s closet.

But the one trait they shared was the inability to satisfy him. They were soft, and wet, and he could fuck them until his mind went white and he came hard enough to stop breathing. But he didn’t want them. He felt nothing when they kissed him or ran their hands through his hair. When they left their phone numbers, he threw them out.

This was who he was. An asshole--an animal. His affection and respect for Haruhi had turned into twisted, jealous lust. He no longer wanted to fuck her because he wanted her. He wanted to fuck her to prove a point.

And he knew, after what he’d done, that he was capable of rape.

When he leaned in to force a kiss, she rammed her knee into his crotch.

Pain blinded Kyouya; he gasped and doubled over. She pushed him back so hard that he nearly fell to the floor. He bit down on his lip deep enough to draw blood as searing, mind-numbing pain radiated from his groin and seized all his muscles.

Haruhi stepped away from him, panting. “That was assault, senpai,” she snapped. “If you don’t want me to report you, don’t do it again.”

Kyouya snorted, although the sound came out more like a wheeze. He was almost amused by the way she immediately quoted the law in their situation. Tamaki hadn’t been nearly so assertive.

_You broke him first._

Kyouya clenched his teeth.

Haruhi balled her hands into fists. “Kyouya-senpai,” she said flatly. “I don’t know what happened to you during vacation, but you have to fix it. You’re turning poisonous.” She paused a moment. “Did you hurt Tamaki-senpai?” she asked, a bit more quietly.

Kyouya looked up through pain-blurred eyes. “What if I did?”

To his surprise, she slapped him across the face.

“Then that’s for him,” she said through her teeth, her voice even but threatening. “Now whatever you did, _you have to fix it._ ”

It was that moment that the door swung open. Hikaru or Kaoru--hell, Kyouya could never tell them apart--poked his head into the hallway and nearly dropped his jaw to the floor.

“Fight!” the little monster cried.

It was pathetic. The other twin and a few guests rushed into the hallway, chattering loudly about Haruhi and the fact that Kyouya’s lip was bleeding. Kyouya’s ears rang with the cries, so he tried to block them out while he focused on getting his seized thighs to unclench. He was vaguely aware of Tamaki coming into the hall, telling the guests to calm down and return to the club. He was vaguely aware of Haruhi stepping back and gesturing to the others that things were fine.

But no one was fooled. The twins tried, largely unsuccessfully, to herd the guests back into the club room. Haruhi ran over to help them.

Tamaki just glared, his blue eyes dark.

Kyouya, breathing heavily, finally managed to stand upright. He met Tamaki’s eyes, unflinching from the accusations and pain that hung in the air.

Tamaki swallowed. “Go home, Kyouya,” he said in a thin voice.

Kyouya wiped blood from his mouth.

_Is that all?_ he wondered, some sadomasochist desire pushing the thought. _You don’t want to take another swing at me?_

“Go,” Tamaki repeated. “Until further notice, you’re banned from the host club.”

One of the guests in the doorway gasped. She whispered into the club room, and a chorus of gasps and cries echoed in the hall to drill into Kyouya’s brain. He’d perhaps never hated those girls more than he did in that moment. The twins and Haruhi forcefully shut the door to close themselves and the guests in the club room at last.

Kyouya furrowed his brow. “You’re only banning me from the club?” he shot, his voice less even than he wanted it to be.

_I’ve seen your cum face._

_You wanted my hands on your dick._

After all the times Kyouya had had Tamaki on his back, Tamaki standing up to him now seemed surreal. The passivity of the bedroom was gone. There was anger now--uncharacteristic, seething anger behind the pain of Tamaki’s expression. Kyouya had never seen him make a face like that.

_You did this to him._

_You brought this on yourself._

_You ended it._

Kyouya’s vision blurred. Half-formed thoughts swirled in his brain, but he couldn’t form a coherent response. He’d expected this, but he hadn’t. Perhaps he’d known he deserved it, but didn’t think Tamaki would go through with it?

Tamaki hadn’t spoken to Kyouya in two weeks. He hadn’t cried or fought; he hadn’t done anything. He’d _ignored_ Kyouya. And that was so unlike Tamaki that the lack of action alone spoke volumes more than any action could.

Until now. The club wasn’t Tamaki’s--it was both of theirs. Kyouya had always had as much to lose as Tamaki and Tamaki knew that. It had started with their relationship. It was their compromise, a parallel to the way they loved each other despite their differences.

“Are you listening to me?” Tamaki’s voice rang through the hall again. His voice was shorter, angrier. It had started to tremble.

Kyouya swallowed.

Tamaki clenched his fists, his knuckles turning white. “Get out,” he hissed.

_Get out._

_Get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out get out._

Kyouya turned around and didn’t look back.

 

**********************************

 

Kyouya couldn’t study that night. He still opened his books and spread his notes on his desk and _tried_ to study, but he couldn’t concentrate. He just stared at an empty sheet in his notebook. For hours. It wasn’t until he heard a knock on his door that he even realized the sun had set and he was sitting in the dark.

“Kyouya-san?”

Cursing internally, he switched on a light so he wouldn’t trip on the way to the door. When he swung it open, his sister, once again, stood in the hallway with her knuckle raised.

“Oh.” She lowered her hand. “You’re awake.”

Kyouya checked his watch. It was 10:32.

_How long have I been sitting there?_

“Kyouya-san,” his sister said, lifting an envelope, “a letter came in for you tonight. Driven over and everything. But if you’re tired, I can give it to you tomorrow--”

“Letter?” Kyouya repeated. “From whom?”

“Hmm.” She frowned and flipped the envelope over a few times. “I’m not sure...the driver didn’t say. But it’s certainly addressed to you...”

As she flipped the envelope, Kyouya saw the kanji for his name written across the crisp white surface. The small light of his lamp caught on the familiar handwriting.

_Shit._

Kyouya’s heart started to pound. He snapped up the letter from his sister’s hands and closed the door in her face. He ignored her muffled protests from the hallway as he made his way to his desk.

With shaking fingers, he tore open the letter and slapped it against the desktop. It was a single sheet, folded multiple times; he smoothed it as best he could. It wasn’t signed, probably as a privacy precaution...but a signature wasn’t necessary.

_Kyouya,_

_I’ve wanted to talk to you about something for about a month now. I **really**_ _didn’t want to write this to you after you hurt me, especially since you haven’t come to talk to me since then. I don’t know how long I want to wait for you to try and make amends. Maybe it’s not worth it, if the way you’ve been acting lately is the way you want to act from now on._

_But even though I’m really upset with you right now, I still wanted to say this because it’s been bothering me for so long. You brought up the whole “gay” thing a few times since that night in the club. You kept asking me if I’m gay, or accusing me that I’m gay, or even used it as a slur, which is really beneath you. Considering the profession of Haruhi’s father and our promotion of love in all its forms at the host club, I didn’t think you would be so nasty._

_For your information, I don’t think I’m gay. I already said I’m attracted to girls, and I’ve never really been attracted to boys. But at the same time, I liked what we had. I liked what we were doing. And when we were doing it, instead of wondering what it would mean as a part of my identity, I just saw it as another way you and I were becoming closer. I guess I don’t mind the thought of being with a boy as long as I already love him. That might make me bisexual, although I’m a little gray on how to define sexuality outside of “straight” or “gay.” I do know that, at least, I’m less straight than I thought I was. And I don’t see why that’s such a big deal._

_I just wanted to tell you that I don’t expect us to run off into the sunset together. It’s not like I’ve changed my mind about girls. I still expect to get married and make heirs, and I still expect that you’ll probably do that, too. I know that it would be really hard for either of us to live an “alternative lifestyle,” considering our families. I don’t think that’s a good thing, but I’m also trying to be realistic. What we’ve done is now just a part of our past, a way that we got closer that only you and I will ever know about._

_At least, that was the way **I**_ _was thinking about it. After what you did, I think you were trying so hard to “not be gay” that you actually stopped thinking about me as a person. That really, really hurts me, Kyouya. That you’re more comfortable with the thought of being with an object than with a boy. That you were willing to make **me**_ _that object out of convenience, despite our friendship. I heard the rumors about the girls...are they just convenient, too? Is Haruhi? Is that what you think sex is? It’s either mindless getting off or something uncomfortably close? You’re the one who told me sex can go a lot of different ways. Why are you acting like all ways are **bad?**_

_Stop worrying about what people will think of you all the time. Back when we first met, you said you were going to stop living by other people’s ideals and be who you really were. Be the real you, Kyouya. Because I don’t think the person you’ve become is the person you are inside._

Kyouya stared at the letter for a few minutes. There was a small part of him that wasn’t surprised with it, since reaching out with a bleeding heart was very typical of Tamaki. But the content of the letter, and the fact that the date scribbled on the top meant it had been written that afternoon...Kyouya _was_ a bit surprised with that.

_After kicking me out of the club for attacking Haruhi,_ he thought dryly. _You still have to try and be Mother Theresa, don’t you?_

Kyouya suddenly realized that his fingers were digging into the letter and crumpling the bottom half. He forcefully relaxed his fingers, but not without effort.

He needed a smoke. And a bath. He hadn’t had either that day, and things had been far too shitty for him to give up his simple pleasures.

Kyouya quickly tore up the letter into as many pieces as he could. He shoved them into the bottom of his trashcan, hoping that that was enough to keep the maids out of his business. After gathering his bath supplies and a box of cigarettes from his locked desk drawer, he walked to the bathroom and locked the door behind him.

Kyouya still found his mind oddly blank as he undressed. He scrubbed himself mechanically as he drew the bath, rinsing the suds off his skin before lowering himself into the steaming water. He took a long breath, leaning his head against the wall and closing his eyes.

_You have to fix it._

The skin between his eyebrows creased.

Now he was hearing Haruhi in his brain. _As if having Tamaki ringing in my ears isn’t annoying enough,_ he thought sourly. He was also deeply aggravated that the two of them kept acting like he wanted to fix the situation. Like he _could_ fix the situation. Instead of allowing him to cut off ties after he’d hurt a friend, they were waiting for him to waltz back in and repair the relationship, forgetting the fact that the situation had proven to him that he was capable of violence. Had they ever thought that maybe he wanted to get away from them for their own benefit? That distance was the only safe choice in this situation?

They weren’t afraid of him.

Kyouya angrily reached over to the box of cigarettes resting on the arm of the bath. _Fuck,_ he thought, shaking a stick loose and pulling it free with his lips. _They should be._

Because he was. He was afraid of himself.

Kyouya swallowed.

He’d brought a box of matches, although it had become a bit damp; he struck a light with difficulty. When he could finally light up and suck smoke into his lungs, he felt a bit of the tension in his shoulders loosen up. He reached over to slide open the small window over the bath. He shivered as the cold air hit his wet skin; he sank back into the hot water until it lapped around his neck. The evening breeze kissed his wet eyelashes as it helped clear the stink of tobacco from the large bathroom.

Kyouya stared at the tiles.

He was afraid of what he was capable of. Fine, he could admit that. It was a reasonable, logical fear. He’d attacked two friends and had regretted it both times. He didn’t want to hurt people, but clearly he could. He’d never thought of himself as a violent person.

He took a long drag, watching ash flutter down and dance on the water’s surface. 

_But maybe I **am**_ _a violent person,_ he thought darkly. _Maybe I’m unfeeling enough to attack people. Maybe I’m hateful and callous. Tamaki and Haruhi know I’m a cold son of a bitch. Why are they in such denial about how nasty I really am?_

They didn’t know who we was. They couldn’t, because _he_ didn’t know who he was anymore.

_I don’t think the person you’ve become is the person you really are._

Kyouya gritted his teeth, crushing the cigarette in his mouth. Bitter tobacco spilled onto his tongue.

Then who the fuck was he? If he wasn’t who he used to be, and he wasn’t the asshole who would fool around with his best friend only to hurt him and leave him for anything with tits, what was he? Was he something better? Something worse?

Something...different?

Kyouya’s vision blurred. He spat the crushed cigarette onto the tiled floor and grabbed a bottle of shower gel. After smearing it on both palms, he shoved his hands under the water and grabbed his dick with thickly slippery hands.

Maybe he was gay. Maybe he wanted nothing more than to screw boys.

Why the fuck not? Fueled by desperation, Kyouya squeezed his eyes shut and started to jerk his limp cock.

_Kyouya..._

Tamaki appeared behind his eyelids, wrapped in nothing but a bedsheet. He sucked on a lollipop suggestively, gazing up at Kyouya from under long eyelashes.

Kyouya grimaced. The scene changed to Tamaki wearing women’s clothes, smiling and pulling up the edge of a short skirt.

Kyouya actually shuddered at that one. His testicles shrunk back into his body, wanting nothing to do with that image.

_Fuck._

Kyouya let out a breath and tried again, loosening the strokes on his uninterested cock. He thought back on that dream he’d had, the one that had replayed an old memory in Kyoto.

_“We should tour the castle, Kyouya! This is one of the tenants of Japanese history we’re looking at!”_

They had been 15. Boys in the humid first summer of high school. Tamaki had dragged him through that audio tour _twice._ Something about not understanding all the Japanese the first time through.

Kyouya had felt particularly stifled on that trip. Tamaki’s arm had been everywhere--around his shoulders, linked with his elbow, and even, disturbingly, around his waist once or twice. Tamaki had definitely been in an affectionate mood that day. It had rained, hadn’t it? Gotten them soaked and forced them to duck into an abandoned information center.

It had been so sticky and humid. Tamaki had taken off his wet shirt, then had laughed at Kyouya’s discomfort.

_What’s the matter, Kyouya? I though the Japanese call this “skinship”!_

He’d tried to give Kyouya a half-naked bear hug, but Kyouya had jerked back. They’d tripped and fallen to the floor in a pile of arms and legs. Kyouya had shoved Tamaki off and warned him to stay back. Tamaki had smiled and finally given Kyouya some space.

Kyouya clenched his jaw. His mind rewound that last part, to the moment where they were on the floor and Tamaki was pressed on top of him.

He tried to imagine Tamaki’s wet skin. The giggles echoing in the empty room. Those blue eyes staring down at him, more affectionate than Kyouya was used to.

_What’s the matter, Kyouya? You’ve never kissed a boy?_

Kyouya swallowed. As his heart skipped a beat, he noticed, almost surreally, that his cock had twitched in his palms.

_It’s not so bad if you already love him. I may be bisexual, you know?_

The words from Tamaki’s letter overlapped with a 15-year-old version of him so oddly. And yet that look in his eye was familiar, that strange affection during those weeks of fooling around. His eyes were three years older and far more familiar with sex.

_Do you want to kiss me, Kyouya?_

Kyouya imagined Tamaki leaning in to lick his ear. He imagined Tamaki’s wet fingers touching his neck. He imagined turning his head so their lips would gently slide together.

_“Kyouya...”_

_Kyouya’s fingers dug into that wet skin, sliding down ribs and under a belt. Tamaki moaned and spread his knees, parking them on either side of Kyouya’s damp khakis. Kyouya arched his hips up into Tamaki, feeling a hard erection grind into his own._

Kyouya’s cock, in the bath, started to harden in his hand. He slid his other hand a bit lower so he could finger the skin at the base of his testicles.

_“Mmm...Kyouya...”_

_Tamaki was struggling out of his jeans, revealing the pale blue of damp boxers. Kyouya pulled off his own shirt and pushed his pants down to his knees. He flipped positions with Tamaki, making the blond cry out as his shoulder banged into the stone floor. Kyouya leaned down and kissed the bruising skin._

_Tamaki panted. He slid a hand into Kyouya’s briefs, tentatively closing his fingers around Kyouya’s cock. Kyouya moaned and pushed through the slit in Tamaki’s boxers. Even Tamaki’s erection was damp, warm and hard in Kyouya’s wet hand. He closed his fingers and elicited a whine out of Tamaki._

Kyouya’s legs squirmed in the bath. He bent one knee so he could slide one foot into a purchase on the ceramic. He panted, the cool wind from the open window pulling at the beads of sweat on his brow. His hands stroked faster.

_He slid his tongue into Tamaki’s mouth and gently tugged Tamaki’s erection. Tamaki moaned and followed suit. Before long the pull of sex drugged Kyouya’s system, and he freed them of their hands so he could slap himself down on Tamaki. He rammed his wet briefs into Tamaki’s crotch, kicking his pants off his ankles so he could hump more effectively. Tamaki squealed and wrapped his arms around Kyouya’s sweating neck. The room was sticky and hot, but they still ground against each other, their skin sliding and sticking, smooth and tight over hips and pelvic bones. Kyouya was bruising his knees against the floor, but he didn’t care._

_And then they were eighteen again, on that leather couch in the club, pulling off each other’s clothes while a dull, throbbing baseline shook the leather under them. Tamaki pulled back for a moment, licking his wet lips and staring through half-lidded eyes._

_“I told them we wanted privacy. You could fuck me right here and no one would ever know.”_

_Kyouya responded by flipping Tamaki over and bending him over the arm of the couch._

Kyouya grunted, his slick hand under the water pumping his erection. He slid further down into the bath, his hips shifting out. The finger under his testicles slid further down his perineum.

_He was back in his car, naked and shivering as he tore open a condom with his teeth. Tamaki eagerly turned onto his stomach, his skin pale in the moonlight that lit up the fogged windows. Kyouya wrapped a hand around Tamaki’s waist, pulling the blond into an arch. Kyouya slid on his condom and shakily pushed both thumbs to spread Tamaki’s asshole._

_“I’m not scared of you, Kyouya.” Tamaki turned his head, revealing glassy eyes. “You already know I love you.”_

_And then they were fucking in that hotel room, Tamaki crying out as his fingers tore into the sheets and his knees dug into the mattress. Kyouya drove in his cock as deeply as he could, gasping at the feeling of Tamaki’s tight, throbbing walls swallowing him up. Kyouya’s fingers dug into Tamaki’s bony hips. Tamaki collapsed his arms so his elbows were supporting him, sending his waist higher into the air and back into Kyouya’s thrusts. He shoved a fist against his mouth and bit down, moaning._

Kyouya groaned and bit his lip. That tingling sense of orgasm was budding in his groin, causing his legs to instinctually spread against the bathtub walls. He tilted his head back as far as he could against the wall of the tub. The ceramic was cool from the open window, and he shivered as it touched his neck.

He slid that wandering finger to gently touch his anus.

_“I love you. I love you.”_

_Tamaki was on top of him in the shower. The water pounded down from over them, making it impossible for Kyouya to see as he tangled tongues with Tamaki. Tamaki gently slid his knee to separate Kyouya’s legs. Tamaki’s hand, gripping Kyouya’s cock, slid down Kyouya’s skin. Kyouya slipped against the wet tiled floor as he squirmed. Tamaki’s finger, gentle and hot, began to rub Kyouya’s asshole._

_“I know who you really are. And I still love you, Kyouya...”_

_Mmgh!_

Kyouya’s eyes shot open.

The thundering of piano keys suddenly rang in his ears, slamming all other thoughts out of his head like a sonic boom. He gasped and blinked; spots of light danced before his eyes.

_Do you like the thought of me fucking you, fag?_

Tamaki’s fist crunching into his jaw.

_Get out._

As the audio memories echoed fainter and fainter, Kyouya stared, eyes wide, at the bathroom ceiling. His hand was frozen over his cock. The breeze from the open window brushed over his cheeks.

The telltale cold sting was the only reason he knew he was crying.

Kyouya’s erection began to soften as his eyes blurred. He curled his body, sliding his back up against the back of the bathtub. He hugged his knees to his naked chest and shakily reached for a hand towel as the tears really began to fall.

Kyouya stuffed the towel in his mouth. Squeezing shut his eyes and praying his family was asleep, he sobbed into the fabric, his muffled wails bouncing off the tile.


	6. Music Room #3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking around this long...especially my original readers, who waited a YEAR for the final chapter alone. Lolipokez's proverbial boot to my proverbial ass was the final push I needed to buckle down and face this shit.

_…Kyouya._

_Kyouya._

_Kyouya?_

Kyouya knew he was waking up. But it was slow, like languid swimming toward a surface that he didn’t want to reach. He felt the fog of his dreams fade away around him. Sensation tingled in his fingers.

A part of him didn’t want to wake up. It clutched to sleep, wishing the world would keep its distance for just a little bit longer. He knew what awaited him there, outside the fog.

“Kyouya?”

The familiar voice pulled at him. He could feel the cool air of the room on his face, the softness of the comforter against his bare neck. The blanket draped over him felt particularly heavy on his chest.

He swallowed. The muscles clenching in his throat sounded like thunder in his ears, pushing down a torrent of saliva.

_I have to face this._

It was a strangely clear thought. A swirl of discomfort licked the inside of his stomach.

As he lay there, supine, he felt slow, final resolution close around his heart. It pushed him back. It pushed him forward. He submitted and was dominated by new, muted assertion.

He opened his eyes.

The blurry outline of his sister leaned over him. Even without his glasses, he could see the worry creasing her brow. The creases quickly reversed as her eyes widened in surprise.

“Oh! You’re…awake.”

She seemed to catch herself halfway through the sentence. She cleared her throat and moved back from his bed.

Kyouya let out a breath.

 _Fine,_ he thought. This was it, wasn’t it? It was time.

Kyouya allowed himself to close his eyes once more. When he opened them again, he focused on the ceiling, pristine white and very far away.

_I won’t do this anymore._

A sort of comfort came in that admission. And even, oddly, a sort of strength. He sighed, that tickle of discomfort still nauseating him a bit, and slowly pushed himself up to sit.

The chink of ceramic tinkled in the heavy air. “The servants wanted to wake you,” his sister said. Her voice sounded very far away. “I didn’t want them to worry if you didn’t respond again. Everyone’s concerned about your health lately, Kyouya-san. You’re so thin, and you sleep so deeply…” She trailed off, and the room settled into silence.

Kyouya clutched his glasses from the bedside table and slid them on to his face. In the new clarity he could distinguish the other shapes on the table--a silver tray, a glass of juice, a plate with toast and fruit, a cup with tea. In his sister’s lap lay a bowl of oatmeal, the steam swirling from its top and her clutching fingertips heated pink from the warm ceramic. She loosened her fingertips awkwardly.

“I thought…if your stomach wasn’t upset, maybe you could try eating? You don’t have to eat everything--I know you never liked breakfast.”

He stared at her. She looked pale to him--pale and meek. His sister had always been of the obedient sort; she always did what their father asked, even if it cost her happiness. But her obedience was deliberate, not the weak sort of submission he saw in front of him now. The crease in her brow, her eyes locked on the bowl. She didn’t look like she was compromising her life for the sake of family unity. She looked like…an emotionally abused housewife.

Kyouya wondered how long she had looked like that.

She glanced up at him through her eyelashes. Her gaze met his and locked for a minute. When she finally looked away, she rose to her feet.

“I’ll get out of your way,” she murmured.

_No._

Kyouya’s response was sudden. But it was only in his head--he couldn’t say the word. He reached out and clutched her arm instead.

His sister stopped in surprise. Kyouya saw himself reflected in her wide eyes.

“I’ll eat it,” he said quietly. He pulled the bowl of oatmeal from her fingers.

Kyouya hated oatmeal. He hated breakfast. He pinched his fingertips around a silver spoon and slipped it into the steaming mush.

His sister watched him in silence. The oatmeal was like a sugary slug on his tongue, but he swallowed it and spooned more. His eyes fell on the toast she’d brought. It was smeared with orange marmalade. The taste of that had always reminded him of the time he’d gotten sick as a child and vomited up orange juice.

He felt fingers gently touch his hair. Kyouya kept his eyes down as he swallowed the oatmeal. The fingers stroked him, then gently slid through the strands…within a few moments his sister had tilted his head to rest against the swell of her chest. Her fingers pressed into his temple.

Kyouya didn’t say anything. He just let his sister hold him as he slowly ate every scrap of what she’d brought.

 

**********************************

 

The ride to school that day felt unusually short. Kyouya threw shut the door of his car and hear the telltale alarm chirp behind him. The parking lot, as usual, was less than half-full--most students were chauffeured, and few even had driver’s licenses. Another car awkwardly tried to back into a parking space next to his.

Kyouya sighed. The days were getting colder; he could see his breath fogging out from over his lips. The morning sun barely heated his cheeks as he dug his fists into his jacket pockets.

“Ootori-san!”

Kyouya turned. A classmate in a jogging suit ran over from the outdoor track, his face slightly flush from the cold and exertion. He panted for a moment while he tried to catch his breath.

“Hey,” he said at last, licking dry lips. “How are you holding up?”

Kyouya was confused. “Excuse me?” he asked.

“Yesterday. You know…” The classmate creased his brow in sympathy. “My girlfriend has a lot of friends who frequent the host club. Word gets around pretty fast.”

It took Kyouya a moment to realize that his public fight with Tamaki had been 16 hours earlier. It felt like a lifetime had passed since then. Gossip, apparently, also treated 16 hours like a lifetime.

Kyouya took in a long breath.

The classmate suddenly clapped him on the shoulder; Kyouya twitched at the contact. The classmate seemed to notice and awkwardly pulled his hand back.

“Er…anyway. I know I’ve told you this before, but if you ever need someone to talk to, I’m happy to listen.” The young man pushed his hands into his pockets and gave a small smile. “And it’s not just because my father admires you. I admire you, too.”

_You’ve told me this before?_

Kyouya felt his stomach drop slightly. The classmate in front of him was familiar, but only in a general sense _._ Kyouya’s mind began to scan an endless mental file of school group projects, family cocktail parties, and boys waiting uncomfortably outside the host club to pick up their girlfriends.

As Kyouya stared at the classmate in silence, the young man’s smile slowly melted. He cleared his throat.

“Um, yeah, not to be intrusive or anything.” The classmate shrugged. “I just wanted to say you and Suou-san are sure to make up fast--everyone knows how close you two are. And I wanted to let you know I’m here for you if you need me.”

Kyouya paused. Slowly, he closed his mental file.

“Okay,” Kyouya murmured. “I’ll…remember that.”

The boy brightened, possibly because of the truth in Kyouya’s voice.

Nearby, a white imported car rolled to a stop in front of the school’s parking entrance. A familiar blond head appeared over the far door.

Kyouya felt that drop in his stomach again. He muttered some sort of excuse to leave as he briskly walked to the school entrance. He saw Tamaki smooth out his jacket as the car drove off.

_Shit._

Kyouya’s mouth opened, but no words came. His feet sped up instinctually. 

 _Wait,_ he thought.

Tamaki didn’t seem to notice him. Tamaki waved at someone to his right, someone Kyouya couldn’t see because of his sudden tunnel vision.

 _Stop._ The words resided in Kyouya’s brain, halted by something in his throat. He felt gagged. Time seemed to slow around him as his heartbeat sped up. _Wait,_ his mind demanded as blood rushed in his ears. _Don’t leave. Don’t walk away before…_

Tamaki rested a hand on the school’s push door.

**_Wait._ **

Kyouya ran the last few steps. He grabbed Tamaki’s arm with all the force of a drowning man.

“T-Tamaki!”

Tamaki’s head jerked around in surprise. His wide eyes met Kyouya’s.

One very long second passed.

_Dammit._

Kyouya abruptly released Tamaki’s arm. Sound faded back into his ears--students chattering, rhythmic whistling from the field, the quiet rumble of cars. He resisted the urge to look around him. People were staring at him, weren’t they? He’d actually grabbed Tamaki and yelled. What the hell was wrong with him?

Tamaki’s eyebrows furrowed, but he didn’t say anything. He stared at Kyouya, hesitant but expectant.

Kyouya’s mouth ran dry. He swallowed hard, but it didn’t help. He had the feeling that he was making a scene, and it was only pushing the words further down his throat.

“Sorry,” he practically croaked. “I didn’t mean to…” He trailed off, swallowed, then tried again. “Sorry for…grabbing you.”

Tamaki’s eyebrows furrowed deeper. 

Somebody honked behind Kyouya and Kyouya literally _jumped._

“Kenji!”

Some student slammed a car door in the parking lot and laughed. Another student from the field waved and ran into the lot.

Kyouya thought he was going to be sick. He instinctually covered his mouth and dropped his eyes to the pavement. His heart thundered in his ears as blood rushed to his face.

“Kyouya…” Tamaki murmured.

Kyouya squeezed his fingers into his jaw.

 _You’re fucking this up,_ he thought, helpless and angry in his own skin. Half of him wanted to scream--and the other half wanted to kill that half. Emotions churned in his stomach and in his heart.

He heard Tamaki sigh. “Did you read my letter?” he asked quietly.

Kyouya swallowed down bile. “Yeah,” he murmured.

Tamaki waited.

“I…want to talk to you.” Kyouya pushed the words past his lips through sheer force of will. “Today. In…there’s no club today, is there?”

Tamaki shook his head.

“Then in the host club room after school.” He stopped to breathe. “Will you come?”

Tamaki’s eyes softened. The creases at the edges of his mouth melted away.

“Of course I’ll come,” he said quietly, something like relief behind his voice. “Right after school?”

“Right after school.”

“I have a quick meeting with a teacher today, but I’ll come right after that. Is that okay?”

 _Is that okay._ Something crumbled inside Kyouya. He felt his eyes sting.

“That’s fine,” he mumbled.

Tamaki gently touched Kyouya on the side of the arm. Then he turned and pushed through the school’s double doors, disappearing into the streams of students that bustled in and out.

Kyouya stood there a minute. He thought he heard someone tell him he was blocking the doorway, but he didn’t have the strength to move.

It had been the hardest conversation of his entire life. And he hadn’t even said anything.

The school bell began to chime, causing the students around him to speed up and rush past him. As he slowly began to put one foot in front of the other, he wondered how he was possibly going to get through that afternoon.

 _Grow up,_ he thought, his stomach dropping at the concept.

 

**********************************

**Brahms Sonata for Two Pianos Op. 34b, 2nd movement:**  <http://youtu.be/YPqK5oWBJT8> 

**********************************

 

Tamaki’s meeting went late. The first ten minutes alone in Music Room #3 felt like an eternity to Kyouya; he simply stood, his hand gripping the handle of his book bag tightly, and stared at the closed door. When his hand started to cramp up, he decided to put his bag down and stand without it. Twenty minutes of that and Kyouya decided to look for a chair. Twenty minutes of that and he decided to undo his tie.

A full hour and a half after school had ended, Kyouya sat at the uncovered piano in the back of the room, his blazer and tie draped over the back of a nearby couch, an unlit cigarette hanging from his mouth. He hunched on the stool and let his fingers gently brush across the black and white keys.

_“Can I play something for you, Kyouya? Do you like Chopin?”_

Images of a younger Tamaki floated in his brain. Kyouya felt his mind drifting back to old sensations--the sunlight filtering through the transparent curtain in his music room at home, the smell of wet flowers in a vase resting atop the grand piano. The way he would watch Tamaki’s fingers drift over the keys like a ship bobbing in a stormy sea.

_“I’ll play anything you want! Just tell me what you like.”_

With the window open, the breeze would bat that curtain to dance around Tamaki’s ruffling hair. Sometimes he played with his eyes closed. He always played without sheet music. Kyouya would sit in that room, the notes from those black and white keys rippling in the air around him, the smell of clean carpeting and flowers and sun in his nostrils…and he would feel something inside of him break.

Kyouya pulled the top two buttons of his shirt open and sighed.

In the first year he’d known him, Tamaki had found every excuse to play the piano in front of Kyouya. Kyouya had always suspected it was because Tamaki wanted to impress him, but as their relationship became closer, Tamaki’s need to catch Kyouya’s interest dwindled. Trips and planned outings melted into after-school tea or study sessions where they sat in silence and read different textbooks. They didn’t need to impress each other anymore. In fact, they barely felt the need to talk to justify being together. Kyouya couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard Tamaki play.

There was an expression, wasn’t there? Growing so comfortable around someone that his presence becomes like air?

_Something you never notice, but immediately die without._

Kyouya closed his eyes. His cortisol levels had finally dwindled down, leaving him with a small, sick feeling in the pit of his stomach and traces of exhaustion nipping at the corners of his eyes.

He’d made a decision upon waking up. Why had he started panicking at seeing Tamaki in the parking lot? Why had he spent the entire day in a cold sweat, every lesson going in one ear and out the other, every thought a jumbled mass of incoherence? He wasn’t going back on his decision. Perhaps a part of him had considered it once he actually saw Tamaki, but it wasn’t a big part. No, this wasn’t a battle with his conscience.

He was just scared. Kyouya was scared out of his mind.

He knew he had weaknesses. Everyone did. He didn’t try to justify his own, but he felt it was his right to have pieces of himself unfixed. Hell, he was good at working around his sensitivities, which was all the more reason to leave them alone. He changed what he had to about himself and whatever was left, even if it _was_ a weakness, was the truest part of him that was left. His weakness defined him more than any of his strengths because it was the part of him he kept completely unchanged.

Touching that was like touching an open wound. He didn’t know what was going to happen. He didn’t know exactly what he was going to say…and preparing for that was like the final step before walking into oncoming traffic.

Kyouya pulled the cigarette from between his lips. He twirled it between his fingers, debating the intelligence of throwing it into a school trash can, before finally cramming it into his pocket. He sighed.

 _I haven’t touched one of these in a year,_ he thought as he gingerly rested his fingers on the keys. It didn’t feel like getting back on a bike--he hadn’t played enough to gain much muscle memory. But he did remember a few notes, and those reminded him of other notes. As he slowly began to press the keys, ghost notes from a second piano accompanied him in his head.

The door to the room flew open.

Kyouya froze. Tamaki, panting and flush, stood in the doorway.

“I’m…I’m so sorry,” he gasped, stepping into the huge room and pushing the door shut behind him. “I can’t believe how long that took and…I-I thought maybe you wouldn’t be here since…”

Kyouya felt panic try to close his throat. He swallowed it down and forced himself into an artificial calm.

“It’s okay,” he said as evenly as possible. He looked back to the keys, finding it easier at the moment. “Just lock the door.”

“What?”

“Lock it, please.”

He heard Tamaki pause. Then he heard the familiar _chunk_ of the sliding lock in the ornate wooden door.

Kyouya waited. Tamaki rested his book bag on a table and walked over to the piano. He was still breathing heavily; it was evidence that he’d been running. When he reached Kyouya he took a moment to catch his breath.

“…Was that Brahms?” Tamaki asked at last, breaking the silence.

Kyouya looked up. His heart was hammering in his ribcage, but it seemed muted and distant. The longer he looked up into Tamaki’s eyes, the further away it seemed.

“I’m surprised you could tell,” Kyouya muttered. “I don’t remember much of it.”

“When did you learn to play?”

“I didn’t. I just tried to figure out this song. I had a video recording of someone playing it.”

Tamaki digested that for a second, then pushed his lips together. He looked away.

“I love that song.”

_I know._

But Kyouya didn’t say it. He didn’t know how much Tamaki remembered. One spring in Tamaki’s bedroom, the blonde flipping through his classical CDs and yammering ecstatically about which ones he liked to play…and then coming to Brahms Sonata for Two Pianos. Some off-handed comment about how he loved the second movement, but he couldn’t play it without a partner.

“Kyouya,” Tamaki said quietly.

Kyouya could feel words bubbling up from somewhere deep inside him. He tried to let them out, but it was strained…like there was some invisible cage in his chest and he had to squeeze the words through the tightly packed bars.

“I wanted…to compete with you. You know how much I saw our early relationship as a competition.” Kyouya set his jaw. “But then I stopped feeling the need to compete with you. So I gave it up.”

Tamaki wilted a bit. “You just wanted to compete with me?” he asked quietly.

“At first.”

“At first?” Tamaki’s voice was careful, but there was definitive hope behind it.

Kyouya sighed. What was he supposed to say? That becoming better friends made him want to _stop_ learning a duet? That getting closer meant Kyouya had to draw _new_ lines between them? How could Tamaki possibly understand that?

“Never mind,” Kyouya murmured, his fingers curling over the keys. “It doesn’t matter anymore, Tamaki.”

“It does matter.”

Kyouya felt a quiet, defensive irritation rise in him. “I’m not talking about this,” he said, scraping the stool against the floor as he stood. “This isn’t what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“I think it is.”

Kyouya stopped. Tamaki had hardened a bit in front of him. His brow was furrowed; his hands were curling into fists. Kyouya saw a shade of the Tamaki who had thrown him out of the host club the day before.

Kyouya had no idea what to say. He just stared, his stomach tightening, and felt every moment of silence stacking a new level on the barrier between them.

Tamaki let out a frustrated breath. “You’re the most difficult person I’ve ever met,” he said darkly. “How many years have we been friends, Kyouya? And how many real conversations have we had?” He paused. “Conversations where I’m not the only one talking,” he added flatly.

Kyouya choked down a grunt. That irritation was welling up again, but it was mixed with the discomfort and fear he’d been fighting all day. The swell was dangerously close to smashing through the floodgates.

“I never…” He swallowed. He had to say something--something he’d already decided to say, at least.

“I never should’ve come on to you, Tamaki.” Kyouya said the words evenly. “The sex was…a bad idea.”

“ _Of course_ it was a bad idea!” Tamaki snapped. “God, if I had any idea that getting intimate with you turns you into a raging asshole, I would’ve punched you back in that champagne room and we wouldn’t be going through all this.”

Kyouya’s eyes fell to the floor. His stomach was twisting and his face was hot. _Shit,_ he thought as he clenched his fists. _Don’t, Kyouya._ He forced his gaze forward.

“Now you’re looking at me like that again!” Tamaki’s voice rose. “What is it? Am I _frustrating_ you? Because I want to be your friend? Because I think the host club is a good way for us to stick together?”

“This isn’t about the host club,” Kyouya interrupted, his voice shaking.

“I kicked you _out_ of the host club! Or did you forget that Haruhi had to fight you off yesterday?!”

“Tamaki.” It was churning through him now--that burning flood of emotion. Kyouya could feel it in his veins, pumped to every extremity by his rapidly beating heart. “I didn’t…this isn’t…” His eyes were blurring. The blood in his temples pounded like a drum inside his skull.

_No._

_No._

A myriad of paralyzing feelings from his childhood rushed back into him. Old, sleeping fears that had only been briefly unearthed during his sexual encounters with Tamaki.

The way Tamaki stared at him now, breathing heavily, his face red and his eyes glassy…Kyouya could see Tamaki’s love drifting away.

It was bringing too much back.

“Kyouya,” Tamaki said, his voice quivering. “Was I wrong about you? Do you…” Tears welled in Tamaki’s blue eyes. “Do you really hate the club? Do you really hate _me?_ ”

_No._

Kyouya couldn’t see. There was a film over his eyes, turning everything beyond his glasses into a sea of hazy pain.

_No. You don’t need me._

_I don’t need you._

_I **can’t**_ _need you._

Cold eyes staring at him over the breakfast table, a desk, a hospital bed. Cold eyes looking away.

Crying into his pillow, hiding in closets, running away from home, punching the ground until his knuckles bled. Hating, hurting, screaming when he was alone. His fingernails raking into bedsheets. His fingers tangled in his hair. His teeth tearing into his lips and flooding his mouth with warm blood.

He couldn’t talk about it. He _wouldn’t._ He didn’t want Tamaki to understand.

Tamaki had so much love to give. He’d had important people pulled away from him so many times, but he’d probably never even considered that even if love wasn’t a choice, connecting with someone was _._ And that some people chose never to make that connection…or to fight it when they felt it dragging them toward something.

Kyouya knew what that connection meant. He fought it every moment of his life. He had opened himself up as a child and it had only solidified his decision to never do it again.

Tamaki was crying now. He’d buried his face in his hands, his shaking shoulders curled inward. “Kyouya,” Tamaki sobbed. “Why are you doing this to me?”

Kyouya’s blurred gaze fell on those quivering shoulders.

_I brought you closer to push my father away._

_I brought him closer to push **you**_ _away._

Kyouya swallowed the words. He wouldn’t say it.

He wouldn’t hurt Tamaki again.

Resolve, faint but growing by the moment, started to leak into the fear and insecurity pumping through his veins. As he watched Tamaki sob, the part of him that had risen up that morning once again gained strength.

Like with his sister.

 _You made a decision,_ Kyouya reminded himself as he clenched his shaking fists. _So follow through on your fucking decision._

Kyouya slid the glasses from his face and rested them on the piano. The edges of the world softened. “Tamaki,” he whispered.

Tamaki clearly didn’t hear him over his own crying.

“Tamaki,” Kyouya said, louder this time.

Tamaki’s glassy eyes appeared over his cupped, trembling hands.

Forcing himself to move--with a combination of desperation and willpower--Kyouya pulled Tamaki into his arms and crushed those curled shoulders into his own.

“Don’t cry,” he murmured into Tamaki’s ear. “Please…I’m sorry.”

Tamaki tightened in shock. Kyouya buried his lips in Tamaki’s hair.

“I’m sorry.”

“K-Kyouya,” Tamaki gasped, shivering as Kyouya’s fingers ran up the back of his neck. “What are you--”

Kyouya’s heart thundered in his chest. He touched skin, hair, tears. He let the instinctual burning in him drive his fingers along Tamaki’s jaw and gently nudge Tamaki’s head back. Kyouya pressed his forehead against Tamaki’s temple.

“I was wrong. I want you to forgive me.”

Tamaki choked. “What?”

“You’re my best friend, Tamaki. And I’m sorry I hurt you.”

Kyouya could hear Tamaki’s blurted surprise. Kyouya kept his face crushed against Tamaki’s ear and neck. He couldn’t look Tamaki in the eyes yet. He was afraid he would end up saying things he would regret.

He wasn’t going to hurt Tamaki anymore. Even if it meant not telling him the truth.

Tamaki’s hands, shakily, made their way up to Kyouya’s shoulders. They dug into the pressed fabric of Kyouya’s shirt.

“Kyouya,” Tamaki breathed. “I…I don’t want to hate you.”

The blood was rushing so hard in Kyouya’s head that he felt faint. _Go through with this,_ his mind screamed at him. _You can’t stop._

“You have every right to,” he murmured. “Everything was my fault. I couldn’t handle the sex. I have problems and I projected them onto you and it wasn’t fair and I’m sorry.”

Tamaki’s grip near Kyouya’s collar loosened slightly. After a long moment, Tamaki hiccupped.

“I know you’re…struggling with things,” he said quietly. “We all see it. Why won’t you talk to me so I can help you?”

_No._

Kyouya forced his head back. He forced himself to look into that endless blue gaze.

“No,” he said, his voice breaking. “I’d rather make you happy.”

Tamaki’s eyes widened. “Kyouya--”

Kyouya cut him off with a kiss. Tamaki’s mouth opened to gasp in surprise and Kyouya snaked his tongue in. Tamaki’s grip implied a shocked sort of resistance for the first few seconds, then loosened and tightened again in what could only be desperate affection.

“Mmgh…”

Kyouya could taste the salty tears at the corner of Tamaki’s lips. He licked them and pushed them into their joined mouths. He let his hands push back over Tamaki’s neck and plow under the collar of Tamaki’s school jacket. He tangled his tongue with Tamaki’s own desperate twisting.

Tamaki’s hands buried in his hair, sending tiny jolts of electricity along Kyouya’s scalp. Their bodies were crushed so close that Kyouya could feel Tamaki’s pounding heartbeat.

Kyouya pulled his lips free slowly, pulling Tamaki’s lower lip with them. He panted, his eyes half-open, as he pressed his forehead against Tamaki’s.

 _I love you,_ he thought.

“I want you to be happy,” he said.

Tamaki hiccupped, fresh tears spilling down his cheeks.

“I-I want you to be happy, too,” Tamaki breathed. “Why won’t you let me help you?”

 _I can’t be happy._ Kyouya ran his lips over Tamaki’s tears. _Not until I change._

“This isn’t about me,” Kyouya murmured. “This is about you. I shouldn’t have hurt you. I’m done taking my problems out on people who love me.”

Tamaki’s breathing grew more labored as Kyouya’s lips ran down his neck. “I-I _do_ love you,” he gasped. “You know that, don’t you?”

Of course Kyouya knew. He knew that look in Tamaki’s eyes because he felt it in the furthest corner of his own shriveled heart.

But Kyouya wouldn’t say it. Not yet. It wasn’t fair.

Kyouya ran his mouth over the soft curve of Tamaki’s ear. “Tell me what you want,” he breathed before sliding his lips over Tamaki’s.

Tamaki moaned into their locked mouths. “We shouldn’t…do this anymore,” he whined between kisses.

“Do you want me to stop?”

Tamaki moaned again, his pitch higher. “Nn…no,” he breathed into Kyouya’s lips. “Not…not yet.”

It was Kyouya’s last chance. He couldn’t erase what had happened the last time they’d touched each other, but he could dim it with the strength of something else.

Kyouya, his jaw set, dropped to his knees. He quickly fumbled with Tamaki’s belt buckle.

Tamaki cried out and jerked his hips backward. “K-Kyouya!” he squeaked with wide eyes. “What are you--”

Kyouya pulled open Tamaki’s fly with shaking hands. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he murmured as he guided out Tamaki’s erection. Closing his eyes, he slid his mouth over it.

_This isn’t about me._

_This is about him._

He repeated the mantra over and over in his head as he sucked Tamaki’s cock. Tamaki made some sort of cry and fell against the piano; Kyouya took advantage of the leverage and pulled fabric down Tamaki’s thighs.

Tamaki’s dick was hot in Kyouya’s mouth. Kyouya had no idea what he was doing, so he just cleared his mind and wrapped his tongue around curves and ridges. He tasted sweat and fluids and smelled the dense odor of sex. His fingers tangled in Tamaki’s brown-blond pubic hair as he ran fingers along the skin of Tamaki’s shaft and testicles.

“K-Kyouya,” Tamaki whined, one of his shaking hands weakly gripping Kyouya’s hair. “Wait…!”

Kyouya realized, faintly, that he was growing hard himself. It didn’t matter. He didn’t even care.

_I shouldn’t have hurt him._

_I shouldn’t have started this._

Kyouya groaned and adjusted the angle of his mouth. He pushed his fingers down and in, rubbing firmly against the path leading behind Tamaki’s crotch. Tamaki squealed and buckled against the piano, his hands splaying wildly behind him. The heels of his palms slammed down into the piano keys, filling the huge music room with loud, crushed notes.

The piano. Oral sex. Kyouya looked up from Tamaki’s waist to see Tamaki staring down at him, tears streaming down his face.

“Kyouya,” he sobbed.

Kyouya closed his eyes and sucked harder. He was going to make a new memory of banging piano keys and Tamaki’s tears.

And the ironic thing was, he didn’t hate it. The moment he had resigned himself to ending sex with Tamaki without caring about his own pleasure was the same moment he felt the disgust fade away. When his actions weren’t hindered by his fears and his complexes, they became superficial. Simple. He wondered how much of his earlier sexual disgust had been indirect, because running his tongue through streaks of Tamaki’s precum suddenly felt like the most natural thing in the world.

Kyouya didn’t know if he was gay. He didn’t care. He just felt his own erection harden every time his best friend gasped out his name. 

“K-Kyouya!” Tamaki screamed as he arched into Kyouya’s mouth. His thighs trembled under Kyouya’s grip as the muscles below his waist pulled taut.

Kyouya slid one of his hands up to the piano keys. His fingers fell on Tamaki’s; Tamaki quickly twisted his hand so their palms could slap together and their fingers could entwine. The union of their hands banged against the keys.

 _I love you,_ Kyouya thought, his mind strangely clear as he waited for Tamaki to cum. _I just don’t know what that means yet._

**********************************

**Second movement:**  <http://youtu.be/yKxzUzd5CAU>

**********************************

 

“Why do _we_ have to drag this stupid thing here?”

“Yeah.” Kaoru scowled as he shoved his shoulder against the grand piano. He grunted and pushed; it slid forward a few inches on its wheels. “Can’t we get a mover for this or something?”

Kyouya didn’t bother looking up from his ledger. “I’m not about to spend club funds on an independent contracter to push a piano from _one side of our club room_ to the other.” He drew a deliberate (if not piano-shaped) square on the small floor plan he kept of Music Room #3, then erased the same square from elsewhere on the sheet. “You’ve got ten more feet. Stop bitching and finish.”

Hikaru muttered something under his breath as he and his brother rolled the piano toward the window. They sloppily adjusted it near the existing piano.

“Here, right?”

Kyouya looked up. The two pianos faced each other, although the new one was noticeably crooked.

He made an irritated grunt. “Do it right, you little shits.”

Hikaru, clearly taking advantage of the fact that the host club didn’t open for another ten minutes, flashed Kyouya the finger. “Do it yourself, tightass.”

“Yeah! Asshole.” Kaoru crossed his arms and leaned against the piano. “Don’t forget which one of us got _kicked out of club_ on Monday.”

Kyouya snapped his ledger shut. “Which is less notable than the fact that I have seniority over you matching stains. You can either do what I say, or I can pull rank and assign you the loudest freshman girls with the most grotesque fetishes who walk through our doors.”

“Pssh. You don’t scare us.”

“And neither do fetishes! That’s how we make our money.”

“What’s going on over here?” Tamaki suddenly appeared, his book bag slung over his shoulder. He frowned at Kyouya as he rested his bag against a couch. “Are you instigating the twins again?”

Hikaru jumped up and pointed an accusatory finger at Kyouya. “Boss! He made us do manual labor!”

“Yeah! I can feel bulky muscles messing up my slender arms as we speak.”

Tamaki sighed. “You’re excused,” he said tiredly. The twins high-fived before running back to the snacks that had been laid out for club.

Kyouya set his ledger down. “That was my fault,” he said, quietly enough that only Tamaki could hear.

Tamaki shrugged and brushed a few golden strands behind his ear. “It’s okay,” he replied. “They drive me nuts sometimes, too.” He cleared his throat. “Have you, uh…talked to Haruhi yet?”

Kyouya paused. “Yeah,” he said, and decided to leave it at that. His conversation with Haruhi had been brief, and he didn’t particularly want to go into it. They had both agreed--although not explicity--that incapacitating Kyouya via his scrotum had been fair payback for half-hearted sexual assault. The decision to put it behind them was coupled with a desire on both sides to never talk about the situation again.

Tamaki walked over to the new piano and rested his hands atop it. He cocked his head, gave the instrument and the window an evaluating glance, then took a breath before carefully pushing the piano into a better angle.

Kyouya joined him to help. “I don’t know if this thing’s even been tuned this year,” he warned. He grunted as they slid the piano to better line up with its partner.

“Then we’ll ask the music teacher to hire a tuner. She’ll probably be happy these old things are finally getting some use.” Tamaki walked around both of the pianos to sit at the stool of the original. He cracked his knuckles and raised his eyebrows.

“Can I play something for you, Kyouya? Do you like Chopin?”

Something stirred inside Kyouya--something tense and uncomfortable. He pushed it into the pit of his stomach. He could deal with it in time…he could deal with everything in time.

“The Moonlight Sonata,” he murmured. “Second movement.”

Tamaki gave a start. He stared at Kyouya a moment, something almost scared in his eyes…then he looked away. He seemed to think it over before smiling weakly.

“Um…sure. I guess it’s pretty upbeat.” He cleared his throat, took a breath, and began to play.

As the first light notes hit the open air, Kyouya felt himself calming down--if only slightly. That discomfort was still there, but he no longer felt like it would escape from deep inside him.

So he watched Tamaki. The window was open beside him, and a light breeze flowed in to bat playfully at the lace curtains and Tamaki’s golden hair. Someone, possibly Haruhi, had put a vase of flowers on top of the piano now that everyone knew it was going to be in use again. Kyouya closed his eyes.

_“I hope you don’t mind that I came over again.”_

_“I learned a new piece. Do you mind if I play it?”_

_“Oh, God, Kyouya--you’re crying! Did I upset you or something?!”_

Kyouya heard a snort from somewhere behind him.

“Second movement?” Hikaru asked flatly. “Way to pick the only lame movement in the whole damn piece.”

“Fuck you,” Kyouya murmured without opening his eyes. He didn’t want to ruin the moment, and he definitely didn’t want anyone to see his gathering tears.

 

End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's an epilogue, but it's kinda lame. I bundled it with some general notes...so you can keep going, if you want. I won't stop you.


	7. Unofficial epilogue, notes, omake

**Notes (posted after original completion/release of this story in July 2011):**

_Sex is a weapon - use it for good._

This silly fanfic is the most substantial piece of erotica I’ve ever written, and since I was going through a rough point of my adulthood as I wrote it, it a.) took several years to finish when I only planned to dedicate a few months and b.) became a real learning experience, since the feedback on this piece is some of the most insightful, intelligent commentary I’ve ever received. You guys are so helpful and oh so very smart. I used to write fanfiction when I was a teenager, and my desire to return to that simpler time in my life is what drove me to do this. (Along with a suggestion from an old friend, Lillian, who piqued my interest in Kyouya and Tamaki as a couple.) That, and I wanted to write something super dirty because LOLs. But this really got away from me and became a weird force that lingered for a long time.

I’ve always loved reading works that take a strong psycho-sexual angle, but because I live an incredibly straight-edge life, I feel weird writing erotica myself. I’m afraid my personal views on abstinence are going to gum up the works and make my writing sound like thinly veiled propaganda. But I’m not anti-sex, I’m anti-stupid-sex, since I’ve seen far too many lives complicated or straight-up ruined because of sexual choices that stank from a mile away. So that’s really the only message behind this damn thing. Don’t be stupid. Sex is the answer to a few problems, but it’s the _cause_ of far more, so keep it in your pants until you’re thinking straight, at least. Then you’re making a _choice_ rather than running on instinct. And I’ll always get behind that, even if I might not agree with the particular choice.

Anyway, thanks for sticking around as long as you did, guys. There’s some bonus material and a cop-out epilogue below as well as links at the bottom related to my future projects. Aw yeah.

**Deleted scenes:**

(These were alternative dream sequences from the beginning of Chapter 5 that didn’t fit with the other ones. They were supposed to fill out more of the plot and Kyouya’s twisting sexual desire, but I figured you guys were smart enough to not have everything spelled out for you.)

_Kyouya was in a love hotel. The sheets were stiff and the room smelled like artificial cherry flavoring, which went with the tacky black-and-red décor. There was red and black hair on the white pillow, and he couldn’t stop staring at it. His thighs were sticky. He knew he’d had sex with a girl, but he couldn’t remember her name or what she looked like._

_Then he was in a small, simple bed in a small, simple room with tatami mats on the floor. He was in a pair of favorite silk pajamas he’d grown out of at age 12. A warm hand reached out from behind him and gently covered his eyes. He felt a slim female body wrapped in a cotton nightgown slide up behind him and press against his back. For some reason he thought it was his mother, even though he knew it was Haruhi. She uncovered his eyes and ran her hand down his face, finally stopping on his chin to tilt his head back. She smiled from behind him, her usual bemused expression melted into understanding. She kissed him on the cheek and licked the same spot. She placed a hand on his chest, then slid it down over his stomach. Tamaki was behind her, wearing those pajamas he’d brought to a sleepover two years ago. He spooned her and looked over her head at Kyouya, her smile mirrored on his face. He rested his hand over hers, on Kyouya’s chest, and pushed her hand down into Kyouya’s pajama bottoms._

**Alternative Ending (final chapter):**

And the ironic thing was, he didn’t hate it. The moment he had resigned himself to ending sex with Tamaki without caring about his own pleasure was the same moment he felt the disgust fade away. When his actions weren’t hindered by his fears and his complexes, they became superficial. Simple. He wondered how much of his earlier sexual disgust had been indirect, because running his tongue through streaks of Tamaki’s precum suddenly felt like the most natural thing in the world.

Kyouya didn’t know if he was gay. He didn’t care. He just felt his own erection harden every time his best friend gasped out his name. 

“K-Kyouya!” Tamaki screamed as he arched into Kyouya’s mouth. His thighs trembled under Kyouya’s grip as the muscles below his waist pulled taut.

Kyouya slid one of his hands up to the piano keys. His fingers fell on Tamaki’s; Tamaki quickly twisted his hand so their palms could slap together and their fingers could entwine. The union of their hands banged against the keys.

_I love you,_ Kyouya thought, his mind strangely clear as he waited for Tamaki to cum. _I just don’t know what that means yet._

There was the faint _choomp_ of sliding wood from far away, but Kyouya ignored it. Tamaki squirmed under him, gasping, then suddenly went rigid as a plank. The hand clasping Kyouya’s went slack. 

Kyouya opened his eyes. Tamaki had gone white as a ghost, his haunted gaze turned toward the door into the room. Kyouya’s eyes followed Tamaki’s…to the now-open doorway, which framed a pair of very shocked twins with a clubroom key in their hands.

_Fuck._

All the coiling feelings in Kyouya’s heart released at once, leaving his heart slack and his dick soft. He quickly pulled his mouth off Tamaki and rubbed a fist over his lips. Tamaki swallowed and frantically pulled his shirt down over his weeping erection.

For a long moment, nobody spoke. Then the twins shared a knowing glance, nodded, and cleared their throats.

“We just realized something,” Kaoru announced.

“Yeah.” Hikaru snapped his fingers and pointed accusingly at Kyouya. “For the last several years, we’ve been making fun of you guys for _nothing._ ”

“Thanks for correcting us. We’ll be sure to remedy that in the future.” They saluted in unison, grabbed the door, and dragged it close behind them. The echo of their flying footsteps were muffled through the thick wood.

Tamaki started to cry.

Kyouya cursed and got to his feet. “Calm down,” he muttered as he straightened his glasses. “I’ve been _looking_ for an excuse to have them killed.”

Tamaki sniffed and shakily pulled on his pants. “Really?” he whimpered, his voice betraying his hope.

THE END

**Unreleased epilogue:**

_(There’s a reason I never released this officially--I don’t like it. I wanted to do one scene a year later through Tamaki’s POV, but I think it compromises a lot of the original ending and fills in blanks that didn’t need to be filled. Also, the necking is incongruous and the whole thing is kinda sloppy, because my heart wasn’t in it. But after writing several different versions of this, I figured this one was closest to acceptable, so you can read it for funsies. It’s kinda like…a fanfic of a fanfic. Which is as stupid as it sounds. Oh, well…Fumi Yoshinaga wrote an alternative, super dirty ending to Antique Bakery with a similar opening disclaimer of I SHOULDN’T HAVE WRITTEN THIS, so if it’s good enough for her, it’s more than good enough for me.)_

 

“You seem nervous,” his father said. “And it looks strange on you.”

Tamaki blinked. He quickly stood from the pliant couch, his hands unconsciously tugging his shirt straight as he did so. “Nervous?” he asked. “I’m not…I mean…” 

Yuzuru Suou sighed. The ice in his glass tinkled as he leaned further into his armchair. “Unless you’re just excited?” he offered. “I know how close you are with Ootori’s son.”

Tamaki smiled shakily, unsure of what to say. He could see his father was trying to be kind by being observant, but his attention only made Tamaki self-conscious. Did he really look nervous? He didn’t _feel_ nervous.

Well…maybe he was a _little_ nervous. And excited. Nervous and excited and apprehensive and…strange.

_I don’t even know,_ he thought, the words filling him with an odd sadness. _I don’t know **what**_ _I’m feeling anymore._

He could hear laughter and popping sounds outside--the guests celebrating the warm night, no doubt. The Suou’s summer compound was more of a guest retreat than a family home, so defenses were down and everyone celebrated together. The servants had a drink. Business partners shared embarrassing stories and business rivals could find common ground in a round of golf. It was an unusually comforting place, especially since Tamaki’s father himself had come to relax that year, but Tamaki couldn’t calm down. Not since he’d seen the message written by the cottage phone a few days earlier.

_Kyouya Ootori is coming to visit Tamaki-sama on Friday._

It had been almost a year. Tamaki had suspected, deep down, that Kyouya wasn’t going to keep in good touch after high school, but the _severe_ lack of communication had been a little depressing. Tamaki’s university was in Kyoto--a few hours away from Tokyo and Kyouya by bullet train. Why was Kyouya coming hundreds of extra kilometers to a beach in the middle of nowhere when he hadn’t even returned Tamaki’s calls? When he’d only answered every other e-mail, and usually with _Everything’s fine, just busy_ like he were staving off a doting mother? Tamaki had been very careful to give Kyouya his space--to not call too much, to not expect too much. But Kyouya’s brush-offs still hurt. Tamaki wasn’t even sure Kyouya was avoiding him. It almost sounded like…Kyouya didn’t want Tamaki in his life anymore.

_That can’t be right._ Tamaki shook his head to clear it. _Kyouya wouldn’t do that to you. He was just busy. You’re overthinking this!_

“Tamaki?”

“I’m fine,” Tamaki said quickly to appease his father. He flashed another smile--a more convincing one, he was sure. “You’re right. I’m just excited.”

He father seemed satisfied with that. He drained the whiskey from his glass. “Just make sure Kyouya-kun eats something,” he said. “The buffet outside could feed twice as many people as we have here. And it won’t keep in this heat.”

“Yes, father.”

“And I don’t want you drinking if you’re going to use any of the fireworks or sparklers. Those things are dangerous--I don’t want you hurting yourself.”

“Yes, fath--”

A servant dressed in casual clothes poked her head through the open window. “Tamaki-sama?” she called. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but your friend is here.”

Tamaki froze. For an instant, every nerve ending burned, hot with anticipation and hopefulness and fear. He felt some reserve of boundless energy snake through his legs and push him, practically running, to the door.

“Th-thank you!” he blurted as he flew out outside. His father called out something behind him, but Tamaki didn’t hear it. 

He recognized Kyouya’s black car; it was parked nearby, in one of the open spots by the beach. The sight of that car always send a lick of electricity between Tamaki’s legs, after the number of times he and Kyouya had kissed and touched and moaned in there. The car gave a short, sharp honk and flashed its lights as the driver’s side door opened.

Tamaki’s heart jumped to his throat and the electricity between his legs crackled as a familiar figure ducked out from that car. Kyouya threw the door shut behind him and turned.

Tamaki stopped.

Kyouya looked…different. His glasses were gone--replaced, assumedly, by contacts. His hair had grown out a little, and it was carefully styled around his temples and behind his ears with something slick. He had gained some height and weight; he was still thin, but sleek instead of willowy, and his shoulders seemed broader. He wore an expensive, black leather jacket that was probably straight out of an Italian leather-worker’s hands.

He looked older. _Much_ older. He smiled slightly at Tamaki, and Tamaki was reminded of the one smile he’d gotten from Kyouya’s father years ago.

“Hi,” Kyouya said.

Tamaki swallowed his surprise. “H-hi,” he replied, closing the few remaining meters between them. He briefly considered a hug--he even raised his arms a little as he approached--but the silence between them was so heavy that he decided not to. In a way, he didn’t even _want_ to, despite his earlier decision to pull Kyouya into his arms no matter how much Kyouya protested. His desire for the casual contact deflated. Another desire, one Tamaki decided not to acknowledge yet, bubbled up in its place.

After several long moments, Kyouya gestured to the beach. “Want to walk?”

Tamaki nodded. _To somewhere far,_ he added silently.

Kyouya leaned against his car to tug off his shoes and socks. Tamaki simply stepped out of his flip-flops and onto the warm gravel.

“Can I leave these here?”

“Of course. It’s our property.”

Kyouya stuffed his socks in his shoes and slid them under the car. Tamaki noted that Kyouya, always so diligent and careful, had decidedly _not_ put what looked like expensive shoes locked in his car. Hidden underneath was probably his concession, though. Tamaki smiled a little at that.

They picked their way through the smooth, cooling sand toward the edge of the water. The sun had already set, and the twilight was rapidly deteriorating into soft darkness. Cool breezes wafted in from the sea, bringing with them the scent of salt and the sour fragrance of sea life. The winds ruffled Tamaki’s oversized shorts around his thighs…and that gentle touch under his shorts did little to calm the strange tension that was building inside him.

Kyouya had to stop at one point and roll up the bottom of his jeans. Tamaki wiggled his toes in the sand, trying to calm himself.

“You didn’t…dress for the beach,” he mused aloud.

“Not really.” Kyouya straightened. “I’ve never been much of a beach person.”

“Then why did you come?”

Kyouya raised one dark eyebrow. He let an audible breath out through his nose.

“Why do you think?” he answered carefully.

Tamaki could sense the hesitation behind Kyouya’s words. That hesitation tipped off a sense of meaning, which set Tamaki’s heart to beating faster. Especially since, honestly, he wasn’t sure what Kyouya was implying. Did Kyouya mean he’d come just to see Tamaki, which he was usually too closed off to say directly? Or was he less closed off now, and he was implying something else…?

Tamaki forcefully reigned in his imagination. “I mean here,” he blurted, hoping that would continue the conversation. “If you wanted to visit me, why did you come here? I was a lot closer to you in Kyoto.”

Kyouya paused. After a long moment, he shrugged.

“It was just a timing thing. I was…preoccupied during school.”

The way Kyouya hesitated on the word “preoccupied” made Tamaki’s stomach clench a little.

Kyouya looked so different. Tamaki couldn’t tear his eyes away from the little changes--the extra height, the longer fingers, the slight styling of his hair. Had they only been apart a year? Kyouya didn’t just look older. He looked…seasoned. Changed.

“Tamaki-sama!”

Tamaki was jerked out of his thoughts by a plain-clothes servant who ran across the beach. The servant reached Tamaki, panting, and held out a handful of thin wooden sticks.

“Sparklers,” the servant wheezed. “For you and your friend.”

Tamaki accepted the sparklers with a small smile. “Thank you,” he murmured. “You didn’t have to run.”

The servant bowed and ran back to a laughing group further back on the beach.

Tamaki chuckled nervously and offered the sticks to Kyouya. Kyouya looked at them, then at Tamaki. That eyebrow arched again.

“I don’t know,” Kyouya said, the emotion behind his voice unreadable. “Aren’t those a little romantic?”

Tamaki spluttered a bit. “N-no,” he said quickly, jerking his hand back. “I mean, not necessarily. Friends and families share these in Japan, don’t they?”

Kyouya shrugged. He pulled a box of cigarettes from his pocket and shook it; a single stick slid out. He gripped it in his lips and slowly pulled it free.

Tamaki dropped his arms to his sides and looked away. He could feel color flooding his face. Kyouya was just giving him a hard time now. It upset him.

_You blow me off all year,_ he accused silently. _Then you show up somewhere you hate, looking totally grown up, and say all these weird things. How am I supposed to know if you’re kidding?!_

Kyouya lit his cigarette. He snapped the metal lid of the lighter shut and held it out.

“Here.”

Tamaki frowned at it. “What?”

“Take it.” He shook the lighter. “For your sparklers.”

Tamaki stared at the lighter for a few moments, deliberating. He eventually ignored it and sighed.

“I was hoping you quit those things,” he murmured.

Kyouya tucked the lighter back in his pocket. He let smoke tumble over his lips and out his nostrils, filling the air with the familiar scent of burning tobacco. “I mostly did,” he said quietly. “But I still smoke if I’m nervous.”

Tamaki stared at him. Kyouya kept his eyes locked on the sea and took a long drag.

_That’s a hint I can use._ Tamaki cleared his throat and pointed down the beach.

“Those rocks go pretty far out to sea,” he said. “If you walk as far as they’ll take you, you end up surrounded by the ocean. It’s really beautiful--especially at night.”

Kyouya blew out smoke. “Sure.”

They walked in silence. Tamaki deliberated on a few questions, but ended up shelving all of them. He wanted to handle Kyouya with the utmost care…he didn’t want to risk Kyouya clamming up if he felt cornered, a response Tamaki had run into far too many times.

“So,” Tamaki tried at last. “How’s school?”

Kyouya pulled a portable ashtray from inside his jacket. “Busy.”

“And, um…your family?”

“Pretty much the same.”

“Do you like your dorm? Unless you’re in an apartment, or you’re still in your family’s house…”

Kyouya ground out his cigarette in the ashtray. “Apartment,” he confirmed. “And it’s quiet, so it’s fine.”

Silence again. “I’m having a lot of fun at school,” Tamaki offered. “I decided to try living in the dorm for a semester, so I could mingle like the other students, and I’m glad I did. It was very…informative,” he added with a small laugh.

Kyouya brushed hair from his eyes as the night breeze batted at him. “How drunk have you gotten?” he asked bluntly.

Tamaki coughed. A small, sick feeling swirled in the pit of his stomach. “Dorm parties aren’t _only_ channels for alcohol,” he said weakly.

Kyouya stared at him. Up came the eyebrow.

Tamaki sighed. “All right,” he admitted. “There was a lot of drinking. I had a _little_ too much one night, early on, and I was sick until the next day. But I never drank that much again.” He scratched behind one ear. “And I don’t like to drink much in general. It’s…undignified.”

Kyouya made some sort of a sound--a chuckle, maybe, but it was without humor. He lit another cigarette, dragged deeply, then slowly released smoke.

“…How are things with Haruhi?” Kyouya asked at last.

Tamaki’s heartbeat picked up again. He swallowed.

“Fine. She’s come as my date for a few social events. And I think we’re communicating better these days. She’s just…very busy with school.” Tamaki trailed off at the end, not really sure where to stop talking.

Pause. Drag on the cigarette. “You’re not dating her?” Kyouya asked through a mouthful of smoke.

“No,” Tamaki answered quietly. “She said she’s too busy to see anyone right now.” 

Pause. Drag. “Are you seeing anyone else?”

Tamaki colored again. “Obviously not, if Haruhi’s busy.”

“I’m sure you met plenty of interested women in the dorms.”

Tamaki looked down. Of course he had. The dorms were brimming with women--his age and older, happy to be there, happy to be free. It was one of the reasons Tamaki disliked alcohol so much. When there was drinking, they were more aggressive. _He_ was more aggressive. His natural flirtation would get the better of him, and a few laughs and a few kisses and a few touches would lull him into a sense of _Who cares?_ and before he knew it, he’d be horizontal on a couch. The first time he’d caught himself, the young woman lying on top of him had already slipped a hand down his pants. The second time, when he’d gotten drunker than ever, he’d come to his senses in someone’s bathroom, wondering sickly why his shirt was gone and why the insides of his jeans were sticky with cum.

It was too dangerous. Tamaki didn’t want to be with those people in such a superificial way. And the last straw, when Tamaki was grinding against someone in a hallway and realized the hard lump against his leg was his partner’s erection--Tamaki gave up drinking entirely for a while. Times of high hormones and low resistance were _not_ the time for alcohol. Tamaki didn’t want to make decisions like that if he wasn’t thinking properly.

But he couldn’t tell Kyouya that. It was too awkward. Too insensitive.

“What about you?” he deflected instead. He immediately regretted it, as his stomach clenched hard when he added, “Seeing anyone?”

Kyouya’s pause felt like a lifetime. When he at last turned to Tamaki, his eyes were black in the dark.

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

Tamaki’s stomach twisted. He wrenched his eyes away.

“N…not really,” he breathed before he could think of a good lie. He winced. “I’m sorry,” he added quickly. “That’s very juvenile of me. You can tell me.”

Kyouya ground his cigarette in his ashtray. “Forget it,” he murmured.

Tamaki felt panic streak through his veins. “I’m sorry,” he said again, gripping the arm of Kyouya’s jacket. “You can tell me. Please tell me?” He could hear his own voice rising in pitch, but he couldn’t help it. Kyouya almost looked angry.

_You’re losing him,_ Tamaki thought frantically. _He came all this way and he’s closing up already._

“I’m sorry,” Tamaki repeated. “Please don’t be mad.”

“Tamaki.” Kyouya pulled his arm free and scowled. “Stop apologizing.”

Tamaki’s mouth went dry. “But…I’m being selfish, right?” he blurted. “Because I told you things are going well with Haruhi. You had to hear it from me so I should be able to hear it from you!”

Kyouya’s eyes widened at that. He opened his mouth, then closed it. He furrowed his eyebrows.

“Do you think I’m jealous?” he asked carefully.

Tamaki bit his lip. Questions, questions. Kyouya wasn’t saying anything--he was just pulling answers out of Tamaki. Forcing him to do all the talking. Tamaki felt that familiar frustration building up in his chest, the one feeling he got around Kyouya that he _didn’t_ miss.

But Tamaki couldn’t be patient now. All the excitement and nerves and fear that had been stewing in his stomach for days had started leaking the moment Kyouya stepped out of his car. And then the desire, the confusion, the uncertainty had streaked through his veins, sending a combination of panic and anticipation lacing through his system to the ends of his fingers and toes. He couldn’t play Kyouya’s games. Tamaki threw up his hands.

“I don’t know!” he exclaimed, his voice nearly cracking. “Are you?!”

Kyouya sighed. He slipped another cigarette between his lips.

“I’m not seeing anyone,” he mumbled around it.

The pressure in Tamaki’s stomach released abruptly, like the opening of a clenched fist. Tamaki was embarrassed at how relieved he felt. He looked away, hot tears stinging in the corners of his eyes, and cursed himself for being so petty.

The rocks suddenly loomed ahead of them, a dark, bulging path that sliced into the sea. Tamaki was happy for the distraction. He quickly sniffed and gestured for Kyouya to wait as he slid the unlit sparklers in his pocket. The rocks were piled a few meters high, so he had to clamber his way up to stand on top. He gingerly spread his feet around. His toes met edges and cracks, worn smooth under the pressure of water and time.

“They’re not wet today,” he said after a moment. “So I think we’ll be okay, even though it’s dark. Just be careful and watch for crabs.”

“Crabs?” Kyouya repeated.

“Yeah, they live between the rocks and come scuttling out sometimes. They won’t pinch you as long as you don’t step on them.”

Kyouya sighed. He ground out his cigarette and tucked the ashtray back in his pocket. “I really didn’t dress for this,” he muttered as he started to climb. Tamaki offered him a hand, which he took once he reached it.

The physical touch sent warmth tingling through Tamaki’s palm and into his veins. The familiar hand felt completely unchanged once it was in his own--all the little physical differences in Kyouya melted away, and they were old friends again, clutching each other with a gentle, steady grip. Tamaki suddenly felt more at home, more perfect, than he had in over a year.

And then Kyouya let go, and the moment vanished. Kyouya murmured something as he brushed at his jeans.

Tamaki tucked his fingers against his palm, rubbing against the lost warmth. He was glad it was dark and Kyouya wouldn’t notice.

“…can’t shake the feeling I’m going to slip and kill myself out here.” Kyouya squinted at the path of rocks stretched out before them. “How far out do you want to go, exactly?”

Tamaki shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “We don’t have to go far,” he replied. “It’s just…quiet out there. And private. If you want to…” Tamaki cleared his throat. “If you want to talk.”

Kyouya dug his hands into his jacket pockets. The breeze was stronger on the rocks, and his hair was getting ruffled in every direction.

“I do,” he murmured.

Tamaki bit the inside of his cheek. He began to pick his way across the rocks, careful to stay slow enough so Kyouya could follow. They traveled in silence; Tamaki felt a new sense of purpose drive strength into his legs. Kyouya wanted to talk. _He wanted to talk._ The path led to some mystical place where Kyouya, finally, might tell Tamaki something real. Tamaki wanted so badly for it to exist.

He heard a slapping sound and Kyouya cursing. Tamaki turned to see Kyouya on one knee, struggling to stand again. Even in the dark Tamaki noticed the rip across his knee.

“You okay?” Tamaki asked. He took a breath, reached behind him, and silently prayed.

The hand slid back into his own again. Tamaki helped Kyouya up, but this time, he didn’t let go.

They stared at each other a moment. Kyouya’s hand was cool against Tamaki’s sweaty palm, its grip firm but careful. Then it strengthened ever so slightly.

“Lead the way,” Kyouya said softly.

Tamaki’s heartbeat started to race. He swallowed that giddy, comfortable excitement swelling up inside him and instead focused on leading Kyouya down the rocks. He felt the awkwardness of the evening slough off him like dead skin--this was too affectionate, too natural to be embarassing. They were boys again. Best friends who’d shared more between them than they’d ever shared with anyone else.

At one point, Kyouya tripped and rammed into Tamaki. Tamaki nudged him back up with a shouder and giggled nervously.

“…What’s so funny?” Kyouya asked, his voice unsuccessfully trying to sound gruff.

Tamaki squeezed his hand. “I just can’t tell if you’re a klutz or if it’s those designer jeans.”

Kyouya paused. “The jeans,” he said quietly.

Tamaki hummed and led Kyouya forward. “It probably doesn’t help that they’re so _tight,_ Kyouya.” Feeling strangely confident in their newfound comfort, Tamaki pressed further. “Why did you wear a leather jacket and jeans to the beach, anyway? Were you trying to impress me or something?”

Kyouya didn’t answer. He just stared down as he edged forward.

Tamaki’s heart pounded a little louder in his ears. “They do look good on you,” he said quietly, not sure he should be saying that one out loud.

Kyouya was silent. He stopped walking, which pulled Tamaki to a halt as well.

For several long moments, Kyouya didn’t look up. When he finally did, Tamaki could barely see his eyes in the dark.

“Can we stop here, Tamaki?”

_Ba-dump._ Tamaki nodded, then unclenched his grip from Kyouya’s hand. To his surprise, Kyouya didn’t do the same. He just continued to grasp him, harder, which made Tamaki slowly close his hand around Kyouya’s once more.

Kyouya took a full minute to collect his thoughts, which was obvious from the way he stared intently at the sea. The breeze tossed his hair, sent small licks of ocean to lap around the edges of the rocks around them. It was quiet in the night; all sights from the beach were distant blobs of light, any sound carried off to elsewhere on the open water.

It was just the two of them. Alone. Far away from their homes, far away from the world.

“I…I needed some time to myself when you were in Kyoto.” Kyouya’s voice was low when it finally broke the silence. Low, but soft. “I wanted to wrap my head around a few things while I was in a new context. My life, my family…” He frowned. “And you,” he added.

Tamaki’s mouth went dry. He could feel the sweat pool in his palms; he knew Kyouya would notice, but there was nothing he could do about it. He tried to stay calm.

Kyouya sighed. “I want you to be brutally honest with me, all right? Even though we both know I’m a coward about these things.” He paused. “Do you…regret fooling around with me senior year?”

Tamaki’s heart leapt to his throat. His hand started to shake; Kyouya gripped it harder. Tamaki squeezed shut his eyes.

_Don’t screw this up,_ he silently ordered. _Don’t, Tamaki._

Tamaki had an answer. He’d had over a year to deliberate on their short-lived sex life, something he mentally returned to whenever he was overwhelmed--it was the pulse point of their relationship, the brutal heart of their feelings where everything they loved and hated about each other exploded into fiery, violent sex. He thought of it with both tender fondness and extreme depression. He’d relived every moment over and over in his mind.

He needed, badly, to be honest about this. He braced himself and opened his eyes.

“Yes,” he said quietly.

Kyouya’s gaze was steel in the dark. There was no moon that night, so the reflection of the stars on the water barely shone in his eyes. Tamaki couldn’t read him.

“Is it because of how I treated you?” Kyouya’s voice was careful. “If I hadn’t assaulted you, if I’d treated the relationship the way _you_ treated it, would you still regret it?”

Tamaki frowned. He slowly raised his other hand and rested it on their clasped ones. _Be honest,_ he repeated in his head like a mantra. _Be honest, be honest._

“Yes,” he said again. “Things might have been better, but I’d still be regretting it. We…agreed it was a bad idea, remember?”

Kyouya clenched his jaw. “So it’s behind us.”

Tamaki hesitated a little at that. It was physically behind them, but emotionally…

It had changed everything for Tamaki. The way he saw Kyouya, the way he saw men, the way he saw sex. He felt like he’d been dragged from childhood into adulthood through a sexual gauntlet, one that left him mangled and abused without any real answers. He thought back on those days before the champagne room with a sort of nostalgic envy. Tamaki believed in learning from his own mistakes, but he also knew that the mistakes with Kyouya could have, _should have_ been avoided. He could’ve said no. He could’ve learned about sex without experimenting with his best friend.

And that day, when Kyouya had forced himself on him…there was a part of Tamaki that would never forgive Kyouya for that. For how Kyouya had handled himself through most of the sex, really. Kyouya had been terrible to him. Tamaki could claim responsibility for some of those mistakes, but not all of them.

“You…kinda messed me up,” Tamaki said quietly.

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“I know you’re sorry. But that doesn’t undo it.”

They stood in silence for a few minutes. The night breeze was growing stronger, and Tamaki shivered in his tee-shirt. But his hands were warm, clasped with Kyouya’s…Kyouya finally, carefully, put his second hand over Tamaki’s.

“We’re very alone out here,” Kyouya breathed.

Tamaki swallowed. It was surreal, surrounded by nothing but ocean. The soft smells and gentle sounds of the water blanketed his feelings, calming him ever so slightly. He wondered, vaguely, if Kyouya had left some of his steely pride back on that beach.

“Then can you be honest with me?” Tamaki finally murmured. “You’re never really honest with me, Kyouya.”

Kyouya hesitated. “I haven’t lied to you tonight,” he said.

“That’s not what I mean.” Tamaki clasped tighter. He was getting embarrassed now, and he found it easier to stare at their hands than into Kyouya’s eyes. “Tell me something you’d normally never tell me. A…secret, I guess. Something secret.”

There was a long pause. Tamaki bit his lip. Then:

“I _was_ trying to impress you.” Kyouya sighed. “With this fucking jacket.”

Tamaki looked up. Kyouya’s face was a combination of angry, tired, and embarrassed. Now _his_ eyes were locked on their hands. “I don’t know, I thought I looked…cool in it or something.”

Tamaki felt a nervous giggle bubble up his throat. He swallowed it back down. “What, like…the cool loner back from college? In his leather jacket?”

Kyouya scowled. “I don’t know. I guess?”

Tamaki couldn’t help but smile. That excited tingling between his legs started again. Kyouya’s embarrassment gave him a weird sense of strength, of bravery. The wind howled over the open water.

“Well…then I have a secret, too.” Tamaki licked his lips. “When you stepped out of that car, I…well, you look a lot more grown up now, like a man instead of a teenager, and you look a lot like your father even though I don’t, y’know, think of him that way--I mean, I don’t even _like_ your father very much, I wouldn’t normally say that but I know you have your own problems with him so you’d understand, but I mean, besides all that, besides the fact that you look bigger and more manly and I like girls and…” He trailed off, his bravery diminishing. He took a breath and pushed the final words out.

“I thought you looked…kinda hot.”

Kyouya blinked. “You _what?_ ”

Tamaki felt blood rush to his face. But once the words were out, his own embarrassment made him a little braver, too. He smiled at Kyouya, his lips tight, and waited.

Kyouya frowned and averted his eyes. “I wasn’t…expecting that,” he murmured.

Tamaki gently bounced their hands. “Your turn,” he pushed. “Now you have to tell me a another secret.”

Kyouya’s eyebrows furrowed. After a long moment, he muttered, “I really miss you at school.”

Tamaki’s excitement fizzled down, concentrating in a small, warm pulse inside his heart. He felt the corners of the tension melt.

“Really?” he breathed.

Kyouya sighed. “You’re a very…genuine person, Tamaki. Even when you’re playing pretend. Hell, you couldn’t _stop_ being genuine when we were necking, and that’s what really bothered me about it.” He squinted. “People are full of shit. I’m more full of shit than most. But in those rare times I want to be honest, it doesn’t mean anything if there’s no one I can be honest _with._ And with you gone, I just…” He tiredly shook his head. “I realized I can’t do it. Not without you. You’re the only one I trust.”

Words died in Tamaki’s throat. Heat pumped through his veins. He lifted one of his hands, affection fueling his bravery, and gently touched Kyouya’s cheek.

“B-be honest with me now,” he said shakily. “About everything, Kyouya.”

Kyouya stared at him. Tamaki’s finger trailed off Kyouya’s chin, then rested gently on Kyouya’s shoulder. Kyouya wasn’t pushing him off, like he always did. He let Tamaki’s hands do what they wanted. His shoulder felt tight under Tamaki’s hand, but Kyouya didn’t move.

“I didn’t…only imagine girls when I was with you.” Kyouya’s breathing grew heavy. “You started to turn me on after a while.”

Tamaki could feel his filters falling. Those delicate blocks, so carefully built up over years of practice, were being punched through by shared humbling in the middle of the sea. The path from his brain to his mouth was opening up, free and clear for everything to come spilling out his lips. Tamaki stopped controlling his thoughts at all.

“I’ve had wet dreams about us.” Tamaki could hear the hoarseness in his own voice. “And in some of them, I’m the one on top.”

Kyouya gave a weak sort of scoff. “I’ve had those,” he replied.

“Sometimes I think of you when I’m touching myself.”

Kyouya’s lips twitched up at the corners in a weak smile. “Pervert,” he said roughly.

“You never touched yourself to thoughts of me?”

“I didn’t say that.” Slowly, Kyouya reached up and gripped Tamaki’s chin. He leaned in slightly. “But I prefer imagining Haruhi and a three-way.”

“Ew.” Tamaki’s heart was racing. Kyouya was so close, so close, his breath warm on Tamaki’s face. “I, um…get a little turned on by good-looking boys now.”

“That makes one of us.” Kyouya leaned in closer, his eyelids drooping. “I only ever wanted you.”

Tamaki could feel the blood draining from his brain, pooling warmth into his groin. Another breeze whipped past them, and Tamaki unconsciously shivered.

Kyouya’s other arm snaked around Tamaki’s waist. “Do you want to share this stupid jacket?” he breathed.

Tamaki nodded, their lips so close.

Kyouya’s forehead pressed against Tamaki’s. “Do you want to…make out for a while?” he whispered.

Tamaki answered by crushing his mouth in.

And then Tamaki stopped thinking completely, allowing the rush from his heart to fuel him. Tamaki kissed Kyouya with everything he had--all the affection, all the uncertainty, all the pent up desire that would never have an outlet. He let his hands do what they hadn’t dared: streaking through Kyouya’s overgrown hair, scraping down over Kyouya’s broad shoulders.

Kyouya grunted and pried open Tamaki’s mouth, letting his tongue plunge in. Tamaki moaned as Kyouya shrugged his jacket down his arms, crushing Tamaki against his chest and wrapping leather around Tamaki’s hips. Tamaki gasped against Kyouya’s mouth and pressed against that warmth, his shield from the wind, from reality.

Kyouya’s erection strained through his jeans, a hard lump against Tamaki’s stomach. He growled and rocked his hips. “You can still do it to me,” he wheezed between kisses.

Tamaki hungrily devoured Kyouya’s mouth. He was so hot already, his penis hard in his loose beach shorts…he felt precrum drip down his shaft, and a wind blew up to touch it, making that droplet a freezing point on his desire. It enflamed him further.

“Kyouya,” he moaned, bucking his erection against the tight denim wrapped around Kyouya’s thigh. “Kyouya…we have to stop.”

Kyouya grunted something--an affirmative, maybe. “Are you gonna jerk off when remembering this?” he murmured between their mouths.

Tamaki giggled and let his fingers slide down the back of Kyouya’s collar. He moaned his own affirmative as he sucked on Kyouya’s bottom lip.

“This is the last time,” Tamaki breathed. “We really have to move on.”

“Do you think you can?”

Tamaki slid his arms up and around Kyouya’s neck, breaking their kiss so he could instead hug Kyouya as tightly as he could. He buried his face in Kyouya’s hair.

“Now I do,” he whispered.

Kyouya’s hands slid down Tamaki’s hips. Tamaki bit his lip, but Kyouya simply slipped a hand into Tamaki’s pocket and pulled out something long and thin. Tamaki pulled back, his fingers still laced behind Kyouya’s neck.

Kyouya dug his lighter out of his jacket and clicked at the end of the wooden stick. The sparkler crackled to life beside them. The sudden darkness was freckled with light, white and scattered as sparks blew up and out. Tamaki saw Kyouya’s face, made sharper with shadows, stare intently down at the light as it burned fast and hard. Then, after only a few moments, the light fizzled away, and he and Kyouya were left in darkness. The charred, mangled remains of the stick sizzled softly in Kyouya’s fingers.

Tears welled up in Tamaki’s eyes as he unfolded his hands. Kyouya gently pulled away, then turned and threw the used sparkler as far as he could out to sea. It disappeared into the black.

“I love you,” Kyouya murmured, his eyes never leaving the ocean.

Tamaki slid his arm through Kyouya’s. He clung to him tightly, burying his wet eyes in the tobacco-scented leather of Kyouya’s arm. He hiccupped and dug in his fingers.

But Tamaki didn’t reply. After all the secrets, all the pain and tricks to get Kyouya to talk, that was the only thing he needed to hear.

At that point, and from then on, there was nothing left to say.

End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can visit www.tokyodemons.com if you want to see the original prose that’s taking up most of my time these days. That’s written under my pen name Lianne.
> 
> For future fanfics, visit the livejournal for my pen name Maggie Danger (maggie-danger.livejournal.com) or leave a comment here. I'm kinda leaning toward Tiger and Bunny next, if I find time in-between Tokyo Demons updates. Goddamn I'm slow at writing.


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